


Taste of a Witch

by nani_punani



Series: malefica [2]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: BAMF Loki (Marvel), F/M, Intersex Loki, Jealous Thor, M/M, Obsessed Loki, Obsessive Behavior, Prince Thor, Slow Burn, Witch Loki, but also soft!young Loki, but not crazy slow, obsessed thor, war games, war witch
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:15:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 41,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24862918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nani_punani/pseuds/nani_punani
Summary: “There are rumors.” Hogun tells him in one of the empty council rooms.Thor, looking over a map of Svartalfheim, does not bother looking up.“What rumors?”“Witch rumors.”There is a saying in Asgard. Catch the taste of a witch and you will never be sane again. Thor doesn’t believe it until he does.
Relationships: Loki/Thor
Series: malefica [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1797472
Comments: 158
Kudos: 432





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is based on a manga called "Scent of a Witch."
> 
> If you haven't read it, I would encourage you to do so! It's really good, and it's inspired the premise of my fanfic!

Thor is born into a nest of vipers.

There are thirteen snakes in this vipers nest. Thirteen bastard brothers. Thor is neither the youngest or the oldest or the middlest. Thor has only two brothers younger than him, Arne and Unn. Arne is dropped as a baby when he is only 11 months old. His head cracks open like an egg on the marble floors. The official statement is that it’s an accident, but in secret, Odin ties Thor’s oldest brother Tyr to a cross in the dungeons and gives him a hundred lashes.

Unn is killed in a hunt at six years old, mistaken as prey. Vali and Vidar take him into the woods and come back with his body slung over their horse like dead venison. When Odin asks what happened, Vali and Vidar blink slowly, before turning to face each other and smiling twin smiles.

They call it an accident.

After the deaths of Arne and Unn, Odin becomes stricter. He lays down rules. No killing on the palace grounds: It’s sacrosanct. Don’t get caught: If you’re caught, Odin will be forced into action. There are more than enough vile rumors about the bastard brothers without fratricide being added to the mix. Other than that, there are no rules. Odin cares little for his sons, and sees it fitting that his successor be the last one standing.

It shows true resolve, he claims.

Arne, the youngest, is killed first. Unn, the second youngest, killed second. Thor, at seven years old, becomes the youngest. His older brothers circle him like prey.

After Thor, the oldest is Baldr. His twin brother, Hodr, is drowned at birth because of his blindness. As a result of this, Baldr does not try to hide his hate for Odin.

After Baldr, the names and the faces seem to blend together. Alrik, one year older than Baldr, is a pretty boy. He joins a brothel and leaves the palace for good when he is fourteen. Sven, Kustaa, and Igor Thor has only ever heard of. They are stationed in different departments of Asgard, and are sometimes dispatched to different realms to guard Odin’s key strongholds. Gulli, the second oldest, is Tyr’s dark shadow.

Vali and Vidar are the middlest brothers. Twins. They seem, sometimes, to be attached by the hip. They have eerie smiles and suspicious eyes. Thor always makes sure to take care when he is in their company.

The golden child in their basket of bastard copper is Tyr. Tyr is the oldest. Tyr is the one most speculate will succeed the throne. Tyr is everything Gulli - the second oldest - wants to be.

Tyr is only eight years older than Thor. His mother was a giantess, and you can see it in the way he’s built. His body is as solid as an oak, and his height almost that of a redwood. Tyr has a body built for battle. When Tyr is fourteen, Odin sends him to the Jotunheim border to serve in his campaign against the giants. Odin calls it a test of his loyalty. Tyr comes back at eighteen with runaway King Thrym’s head.

But the thing that sets Tyr apart from the rest of his beastly brothers is that he’s smart too. He has a mind for strategy. He’s on good terms with most of Odin’s war council, and he has enough charm to get him places.

When Thor is only eight, Tyr takes him deep into the woods on horseback, and then leaves him there. When Thor makes it back a week later, Tyr laughs and says it was only a joke.

But there is something displeased in his eyes that speaks otherwise.

Thirteen brothers, from eleven different mothers, and all of them hate each other the same. All of them plot the others downfall. All of them murderous baby vipers with venom thrumming through their veins.

Love isn’t something that exists in a place like that. Love isn’t something that is _allowed_ to exist in a place like that.

No, what exists is this:

The fact that Thor knows, from a young age, that the throne will be his.

And that he’ll do anything to get it.


	2. The Third Son

“Your brother Kustaa has been poisoned.”

Those are the first words Volstagg speaks to him when he meets Thor in the training yards.

Thor, in the ring, pauses at the words, his sword against maester swordsman Valka’s.

Valka steps away and so does Thor, throwing his sword at Valka to catch. He jumps the wall separating the ring and the yard and takes off his armor, pushing the sweat out of his brow.

“Kustaa?” He asks, surprised. “He’s only been in the palace two days. Don’t tell me there’s already been a threat on his life? And so close to his birthday?”

Volstagg shrugs. “He was poisoned on the way here. They say he doesn’t have much to live.”

Thor stares, still unbelieving. “That’s impossible. He has a taste tester. He has a whole retinue of doctors and poison specialists at his side. And you tell me he’s been poisoned?”

“You know as well as I do that the number of people by your side means nothing if they are not loyal. If they can swayed by coin.” Volstagg says simply.

“But his taste tester,” Thor insists. “Hasn’t she saved him eight times already?”

“Thirteen,” Volstagg corrects. “And I guess that was already too much for her.”

Thor goes quiet, in his own head. Then he looks up at Volstagg and grins.

“I can't believe it.”

Volstagg grins back. “Believe it.”

Thor laughs. “What wonderful news. I wonder who did it? I wonder how they got that girl to betray him, when she’s been by Kustaa’s side since I was a child.”

“Who knows?” Volstagg shrugs. “But if you ask me, my money’s on Vali and Vidar. Those snakes. It’s only fitting.”

Thor goes pensive again. “Probably, huh? But it doesn’t matter now. My _dear_ brother is on his death bed.” Thor smiles again, except this time there is an edge to it, something hungry in his gaze.

“It’s only fair I go and pay my respects.”

-

Kustaa stays in one of the farthest corners of the palace. When Thor reaches his quarters, the smattering of guards by his door is less than usual. Probably since the need for them seems irrelevant now.

The pat him down and when satisfied that he holds nothing lethal (as if it would matter at this point) they let him through.

Kustaa lays in his canopy bed, covered in the finest silks and fabrics. His room is the very definition of luxury. It serves a contrast against the pallid color of his skin.

“Brother Kustaa.” Thor greets, not bothering to bow his head. He has never bowed in the past, and he will not start now.

Kustaa looks up at him with disinterested eyes.

“Brother Thor.” He greets back. “Come here to gloat?” There is no maliciousness in his tone. It is matter of fact. As if he could care less otherwise.

“Not really,” Thor replies back dully, hands roaming over Kustaa’s things. “I’ve only come to say my goodbyes. How does it feel being poisoned not even two days since you’ve set foot in the palace?”

Kustaa looks at him oddly. “I find it strange,” he says. “Out of all our brothers, I wouldn’t have expected you to come visit me. You’ve not been in the palace a long time now, either, have you? Last I heard you were in Svartalfheim, helping father with his campaign against the Dark elves.”

Thor lifts a music box, examines it, then sets it back down gently.

“You’re right. I’ve only been here two weeks. If it wasn’t for that jealous bastard Tyr, I would still be out there. I don’t think he liked the fact that Odin praised my efforts and not his. So he sent me back here on the pretext of my injury.”

Kustaa’s eyes go to Thor’s ankle. “I noticed.”

Thor frowns. “It’s not that bad. Tyr just doesn’t want me to win Svartalfheim. He knows if I do then our chances for the throne will be tied again.”

“How long were you out there?”

Burning skies light behind Thor’s eyes. He tries to shake the image away.

“Four years. Since I was 15. Before that I was in Jotunheim but…”

“But not as long as you were in Svartalfheim.” Kustaa finishes for him. “I know. I was in Jotunheim too. Tyr hijacked that campaign, though. Made it his. But he was there longer than any of us were, so I suppose it was only fair. Svartalfheim to you is what Jotunheim was to Tyr. It’s yours.”

Thor looks up at Kustaa, slightly surprised. “You think so? I thought you side with Tyr, being closer to him and all.”

“Why, because we’re closer in age?” Kustaa scoffs. “I’m not close with any of you. I’m just stating the facts. You’ve been in Svartalfheim longer than he has. Just because he’s older, doesn’t mean he can make it his.”

“Well, that’s what he’s trying to do,” Thor says acidly, picking at another ornament on Kustaa’s dresser.

“Didn’t you kill some big name colonel of theirs? Tyr went into a rage over it. I know because he was visiting in Alfheim and as soon as he heard the news he ran for Svartalfheim. People were saying it was a massacre. That you wiped out an entire battalion.”

_Images flash in Thor’s mind. Trenches filled with mud and bodies and rats. Dark elves impaled on sticks. A sword slicing through a man’s head. Burning villages and children screaming in a language that sounds like music, their parents rotting beside them, eyes melting out of their heads from the heat._

Thor turns around briskly and affects an indifferent attitude.

“Boring.” He states flatly. “Why are we talking about my military campaign? I’d much rather know who you think poisoned you.”

If Kustaa finds it strange that he changes the subject, he does not say so, simply giving Thor an odd look before replying.

“Vali and Vidar.” Kustaa says drily. There is distaste on his face. “One of my chamber members has discovered the poison I was given. There is an antidote, but it is very hard to find. And the last hours speak of an excruciating death in which my very intestines will dissolve. Who else could speak of such cruelty but Vali and Vidar?”

And it’s true. Out of all Thor’s brothers, Vali and Vidar are the cruelest - have a taste for things that could curl even the most hardened stomach’s.

“Do you think they’ll find the antidote?”

“No,” Kustaa says indifferently. “The poison is fast acting. Already I’ve been throwing up blood. The nobles that back me are becoming nervous, however. Even now, they are scrambling to find an antidote to save me.” Kustaa smiles grimly. “Or rather, themselves, as Vali and Vidar will likely take their heads when I am dead.”

Thor squints. “You’re rather strange, Kustaa.” He says, frowning. “You do not seem afraid at all to die. I confess I thought I would be facing a madman when I entered the room. I thought you would throw things at the very sight of me, at the least.”

Kustaa sighs. “I am tired, Thor. Life as a prince is so very much harder than dying.”

Thor stares at him. “You’re telling me you don’t like being a prince? That you have never once, longed for the throne?”

_Impossible. What a liar. It is all any of us want. To lie now is to save his pride, for having lost at the game._

Kustaa stares back, undaunted. “You’re asking me if I like being a prince? If I like having a target on my back? If I like having to constantly wonder who I can trust, and who behind me is holding a dagger at my back? If I like having a father who is a monster? If I like that fact that, in order to have his power, I must kill my very own brothers?”

“But it’s the throne,” Thor insists. “You would forsake such power over all nine realms?”

Kustaa only stares at him, incredulous. “Vain boy, have you not heard what I said? What is such power if I have no one that I can trust? If I have no one to share it with?”

And Thor goes quiet all of a sudden, simply staring at Kustaa and his stony features. Kustaa, with his hard jaw, and his square face. Kustaa, the third oldest Odinson, always so quiet, always in the background, not one to put on airs or false pretenses. Straightforward and honest and

 _Oh_ , Thor finally thinks. _He wasn’t lying. He has always been this way, hasn’t he? Even when I was younger, he never, not once, laid a hand upon me…_

“I forgot…” Thor trails off. “You have always been mad in this way. You have never craved the things the rest of us have craved.”

Kustaa, quickly and all of sudden, laughs. It proves the be the wrong thing to do when he starts to cough up blood.

“Me, mad?” Kustaa laughs, bringing a handkerchief to his mouth to wipe away the blood. “You lot are the mad ones. How old are you now, boy?”

Thor bristles at the title. “I am nineteen.” He replies coldly. “And I have not been a boy for a long time now.”

Kustaa only smirks. “You are still very young, brother. The youngest of all us.”

“And yet I am alive, and here you lay dying.”

Kustaa’s eyes shift at this, something curious. “Yes,” he replies vaguely. “You have always been like this…so strangely powerful. It is no wonder Tyr fears you.”

It is Thor’s turn to laugh. “Tyr? Fear me? It is too late for such flattery, Kustaa. It will get you nowhere.”

“You say that, but I have spent six more years on this planet with Tyr and Gulli than you have. There was time when it was only the three of us. I know them far better than you ever will.”

Thor scoffs. “Tyr doesn’t fear me. He hates me, yes, maybe far more than our other brothers, but he doesn’t _fear_ me.”

Kustaa watches Thor carefully. “Tyr left you in the woods, don’t you remember?”

“He also murdered Arne when he was only 11 months old,” Thor says drily. “What’s your point?”

“Yes, but he killed Arne when father hadn’t explicitly forbade it. He tried to kill you after. The woods are still palace grounds, Thor. Tyr went against father’s orders.”

“But nothing happened, did it?” Thor shoots back.

Kustaa smiles ominously. “Only because Odin never found out about it. But tell me something, Thor, would you ever go against father’s orders, to kill a child? A child who, not even of age, showed prowess in nothing – would you go against a king’s orders, just to kill him?”

Thor goes quiet in response.

Kustaa smiles something far away, and leans back in his bed. “That’s what I thought. Now pass me my pipe.”

Thor passes Kustaa a pipe that is by his bedside table. If he were not dying he wouldn’t bother. But Kustaa has always been his…nicest brother, for a lack of a better word. Whenever Gulli would terrorize him when he was younger, or even Vali and Vidar, Kustaa always put a stop to it.

Kustaa sucks in, then blows out slowly. An overly saccharine smell fills the room. He stares at Thor with droopy eyes.

“Is there anything else you have to say to me? Or was that the extent of your pleasantries?”

Thor blinks, suddenly startled back to life.

“Actually, I had a gift for you.” Thor pauses, then smiles. “Consider it a birthday gift, since yours is in three days.”

Kustaa snorts. “I will not be alive in three days.”

“Precisely,” Thor says pleasantly. “Which is way I’m giving it to you now. You were betrayed by your taste tester, were you not?”

Something flashes in Kustaa’s eyes that Thor does not recognize. For a second, his gaze seems guarded.

“Yes, I was. Why?”

“I remember her. Such a lovely face, how could I not? Brown hair and warm brown eyes. That polite and shy way of talking that made it very evident she was from the country. I even remember her name. Avinna. And how she once told me about the small town where she was from…”

“I don’t understand,” Kustaa says, his gaze suspiciously blank, but, if you were paying attention, his fist clenched so tight the knuckles were white. “Why are you telling me this?”

Thor blinks. He thinks it’s very obvious why he’s telling Kustaa this.

“That’s your birthday present,” Thor says plainly. “The girl. She got away, didn’t she? I know where she’s hiding. I’ll drag her back, alive, tied to my horse by her ankles. Money has such a way of making people talk, that I found out she has three sisters. I’ll find out which one’s her favorite, and I’ll kill her before Avinna’s very own eyes.” Thor pauses suddenly. “Or would you like the honors? I suppose you would, considering-“

“Stop.”

“It’s not a big deal, honestly, it’s the least I could do-“

“I said _stop_.”

Kustaa has knocked over the water basin on his table. He’s breathing hard, a whirlwind of emotions on his face.

The sight is so odd, Thor can’t help but stop. When his voice comes back to him, he speaks.

“I don’t understand.”

“I don’t want Avinna dead. In fact, I would prefer it if you didn’t mention this to anyone at all.”

Thor’s frustration builds.

_Here I am, offering him a gift. I don’t have to offer him a gift. I don’t need to offer him a gift. Yet still, he rejects it?_

“I’m sorry, am I missing something here?”

“I love her.”

The words feel like a boulder striking the quiet lake of Thor’s thoughts.

“You – you love her? The person who betrayed you?”

_What?_

The thought rattles unintelligibly inside Thor’s head. Thor cannot fathom even loving the kindest and most benevolent of women. So how could Kustaa love someone who’s betrayed him?

“Yes,” Kustaa replies firmly, though he must know he sounds like an idiot. “I love her. And if I tell you this, it’s because I know that unlike the rest of our brothers, you are not prone to fits of unwarranted cruelty. And I trust in your discretion.”

Thor shakes his head at his brother, disbelieving.

 _Pathetic_ , he thinks. _Silly_. _Weak._

“She should hang for what she has done to you. You are blinded-“

“Avinna had been with me for six years,” Kustaa cuts in abruptly. “When I turned 20, father cast me out of the palace. You know, as well as I do, that that is the age he sends us to guard his strongholds. But you do not know how hard it is, even outside a military campground. At least in a camp, there were rules, because father placed them there. Outside of father’s domain, there were no rules. I went through dozens of taste testers. Many of them had been planted by Tyr. Some others by Gulli or Vali and Vidar. Many of them died in gruesome ways, subject to the poisons that had been sent to kill me.”

“When I turned 21, they nobles who supported my claim to the throne sent me a girl. She had just turned eighteen. She had grown up in the jungle lands of the Alfheim realm. She was an ideal candidate to be my taste tester because she was resistant to most poisons. They could not kill her, but she would still show the signs of a poisoning in minor ways such as a rash or a swelling of the tongue.”

Thor watches his brother critically, and wonders where he’s going with this.

“I did not trust her when she first came. She was too pretty. Too nice. Too naïve. I didn’t think a person like her could exist in real life. I thought she was another person sent by Tyr to kill me. I treated her horribly. Sometimes, I would have the food poisoned on purpose, knowing she had to eat it before me, making her sick in the process. But still she would make conversation with me, talking about the weather, or what a beautiful day it was. Sometimes, she would even dare ask me how I felt, or if I ever felt lonely. I would lash out the worst when she asked me these questions.

“Then one day, I was poisoned. I fell into a stupor like this one, but to a lesser degree. I finally had a reason to execute the girl I always felt had been planted by Tyr. I sent her to the dungeons. The way she cried that day,” Kustaa says, a haunted look on his face, “I will never forget. She said she had not tasted the food before hand. The cooks said otherwise. It was easier, to believe that one person had tried to kill me, than a whole retinue of my kitchen, especially when the cooks had been with me for longer.”

“Somehow, I made it out of my bed that night. I was dying of thirst. Otherwise, being so ill, I would have never have made it out.” Kustaa smiles grimly. “I’m sure this is what the cooks thought as well. That I would never deign to go the kitchen in the middle of the night, being so ill.” Kustaa pauses. “But I did.”

“And when I got there, I heard the truth. The daughter of one of the cooks was crying. She said she did not think it was fair that Lady Avinna would have to take the fall for what they had done, having been so kind to everyone. Her mother agreed that it was unfair, but replied that life was unfair. I did not know then, but I had killed three of her sons tamping down a rebellion in Alfheim. They were Asgardians, but they had not died in battle, no. They had died by my own hand, hung as deserters, foods for the vultures, with the ravens pecking out their eyes. I hung them there in the middle of a camp for almost a whole month, a warning for the other soldiers. Their cocks had been cut, as well as their fingers and toes, mockeries of what they once were. And the youngest one was only 12.”

Thor is unmoved.

“They deserted.” He says flatly. “They deserve what they got.”

Kustaa, for his part, smiles grimly. “I am not surprised you think so. You are, after all, Odin’s son. But I am no longer 19, like you, Thor. I can understand plenty the reasons they deserted. They were nothing but peasants, underage, and forcefully conscripted into an army by a king who has never done a single thing for them, or will pay them for their service. And now this king expects this peasant child to fight for him, over a land that is not his? Ridiculous.”

“Such are the ways of power, brother.” Thor replies back coolly.

“Yes. But that does not make it right,” Kustaa says, watching him carefully. “Either way, something changed that day. I fired the cooks on the pretext that I was dying. I never told anyone about what I heard that day, so they did not hang. They left, likely satisfied at the thought that I would die alone. Then, I freed Avinna from the dungeons. I told her she was free to leave. I told her I was sorry for everything that I had done to her, and this was my punishment from the Gods.”

“And still,” Kustaa says, gaze far away, “a part of me, even knowing she was not a spy of Tyr, waited to see her true face. With all the cards in her hand, I wanted to see how she would act. If she would gloat at my punishment for not believing her. If she would spit on my face and tell me how, secretly, she had hated me all along.”

“So imagine my surprise…when she burst into tears. When she fell at my feet and cried. She yelled obscenities at me, yes. Called me stupid. But only because I didn’t trust her. She said the only thing she’d ever wanted, since she had come into my residence, was for me to trust her. For us to be on good terms. For me to _talk_ to her, because she was as isolated as I was, so far away from her family, and not on good terms with the rest of the staff because of her position so close to me. And as my people feared and hated me, so they did her.”

A strange light seems to fill Kustaa’s eyes.

“She saved my life that day. She recognized the poison in my system. While the rest of my staff was fleeing, and the guards posted at my door thinning in number, she stayed by my side. She had long gained immunity to the poison. Her blood had already created antibodies against it. So she cut open her wrist and fed me her blood. And I have trusted no one more ever since.”

“And yet here we are again.” Thor says, smiling thinly. “You, poisoned. The guards posted at your door dwindling. And your precious Avinna nowhere in sight. What does that say about your love?”

Kustaa closes his eyes, like the very truth of it hurts him. He takes a long drag of his pipe, and then blows it out.

“Like you said, she has three sisters. Vali and Vidar threatened her life at first. When that did not work, they threatened her family. So she pretended to taste test my food, and then let me eat poison. Then she fled before the nobles who backed me could kill her.”

“And you know this, how?”

Kustaa opens his eyes again. “Because she came back, days later, in the middle of the night, to my rooms. She confessed what she had done. She said she understood if I never forgave her, but she could not let such a vile thing happen to her sisters, and considering Vali and Vidar, I’m sure it would not have been a simple execution. She wanted to die by my sword.”

Thor listens in rapt attention, unintentionally caught up in Kustaa’s story.

Kustaa exhales. “So I let her go.”

“You,” Thor stares. “You _what?_ ”

“How could I blame her for doing what she had done, if that same heart of hers was the one that saved me years ago? And wasn’t I simply paying back what she had already given me? She owed me nothing. I told her to leave. She didn’t want to, but I told her if she didn’t, I would do far worse to her sisters than Vali and Vidar ever would. She knew I was lying but she left anyway. She was crying. And before she left –“ Kustaa pauses, his face pained, his fist clenched around the covers, “before she left she told me that she loved me.”

Thor watches a series of complicated emotions pass over Kustaa’s face. He wonders who this stranger is. This stranger wearing his brother’s face. All his memories of brother Kustaa include his cold demeanor, his face that never gave anything away.

“And I realized, then,” Kustaa takes a long drag, releases, “that that was probably what I’ve been waiting to hear my whole life.”

There is nothing, save for the sound of smoke being exhaled, for a long time.

“So that’s it?” Thor says flatly. “That’s your grand love story?”

_What a pitiful ending. Dying for a throne would’ve been more fitting._

Kustaa shrugs. His pupils are blown wide. “I can die happy now, which is more that can be said for any of you. I haven’t been happy for a long time now.”

“I’m happy.” Thor snaps defensively.

“Oh yeah?” Kustaa raises an eyebrow. “What are you happy about?”

“That you’re dying. That I have one less competitor for the throne.”

Kustaa gives Thor a pitying look. “The death of a brother? What a sad, sad thing to be happy about. It speaks volumes of the lack of joy in your life.”

Thor feels annoyance prick at his skin like a million needles.

_Who is he to look at me with pity?_

“Whatever. Father never had love in his life, and he got the throne. I think _that_ speaks volumes.”

Kustaa laughs, suddenly and abruptly. At Thor’s blank look, he makes a weird face.

“Don’t tell me you don’t know?”

“Know what?”

Kustaa stares at him for a long time before speaking. “Father would’ve given everything away, even the throne, for love.”

Thor recoils, disbelieving.

Snapshots of Odin flash through his mind. Every time Odin hit him, or called him useless, or said his existence was worthless. The time Odin said the only thing worth anything in this world was power.

_For love? What nonsense. Father is the most logical person I know._

“You’re lying.” He spits.

Kustaa stares at him odd. His eyes flash, for a second, to Thor’s golden hair.

“Odin never told you about your mother?”

“Why would he? He never talks about your mothers.”

“But…your mother was different, Thor. You weren’t just some bastard dropped on the doorstep of Borrheim. Odin brought your mother here. He kept her locked somewhere, away from the rest of us. He wanted to marry her. Tyr, he probably remembers her best, out of all of us…”

Thor blinks, surprised by the information, but trying not to show it.

“Well, she’s not here now. So he must have gotten bored of her.”

“Thor…” there is something in Kustaa’s voice now, something pained. “Odin really never told you?”

“Told me what?” Thor demands.

“After you were born…your mother killed herself.”

Thor is unable to process the words. “What?”

The door to Kustaa’s chambers burst open. The guards all form rank around Thor, a reedy man commanding them, red faced and bristling.

“What did I tell you about guests, Kustaa!”

Kustaa closes his eyes, tired. “It is only my younger brother, Lord Helsinki.”

“Well your brothers are all murderers and thieves!” The reedy man rages, a vein throbbing on his forehead. “So excuse me if I am not comforted by the fact! Knight Pelebis, please escort this young man out of the room.”

Thor squeezes close to Kustaa before the knight arrives.

“About my mother-“ He whispers, “what was that you said-?”

Kustaa grabs him tightly by the wrist all of a sudden.

“Thor,” he says, eyes black, pupils eating up the irises. “I don’t have much time. Already I can feel my lungs collapsing from the poison those twin snakes have fed me. If you really want to give me a birthday present, buy me aster crystals and pass them to knight Vikter. I’d rather die of an overdose than die from what Vali and Vidar have in store for me.”

“Yes, Kustaa, but what about my –“

“Tyr knows more about your mother than I ever will. The only reason I know so much about her is because of him. He used to talk about her all the time. He even knew where Odin hid her, but he would never tell us where. But, Thor, don’t forget,” and Kustaa stares at him, with his eyes like a blackhole, “my aster crystals. Please. I beg of you.”

And then knight Pelebis is pulling him away from Kustaa, pushing him out the door, the reedy man screaming at Kustaa for allowing Thor to get so close, and the last of Kustaa that he sees before the door shuts is him smoking his pipe in front of the man’s face, Thor finally realizing that the sickly sweet smell he recognized is burning aster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thoughts? lmk!
> 
> also note: im prob only gonna update this to when loki and thor meet, since that's what yall are all waiting for anyways, and i have other works i need to get back to.
> 
> if none of my other works are updating rn its because im taking microbio classes so im extremely busy! pls be patient with me!


	3. Loki The Witch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a full moon means loki becomes a girl. he is no longer dual sexed. he has no cock.

If there is one thing Odin hates, it’s witches.

He doesn’t care much for ruling other than conquering, and cares little about laws that have no relation to him, but if there is one law he actively maintains it is the persecution of witches.

_Thou shall not suffer a witch to live._

Thor finds it at odds with the rest of him. For a man so coldly logical, the persecution of witches seems an illogical action. For a man so disinterested in anything law related, he maintains this law with a passion.

In Vanaheim, witches are revered. Thor only knows this because he father sent him on a campaign to Vanaheim when he was young. There are no books or stories written about in Asgard, but in Vanaheim, to be a witch is to have a ticket to power.

They have gilded churches dedicated to the training of these witches, complete with elaborate golden spires and stained glass. They have pretty names too, like the Church of Five Stars, a popular church in the capital of Vanaheim.

In Asgard, there are no churches dedicated to witches. Only pyres.

When Thor is a child, his father takes him and Baldr to a burning. Thor is only eight at the time and Baldr is nine. Baldr, who hates Odin with a passion, throws a fit when he tries to make him go and eventually locks himself in his room.

“Father will be upset,” Thor tells him through the wood, sitting on the cold marble floor and tracing dust. It is a warning.

“Good,” Baldr replies simply. “I want him to be upset. I want him to be upset for the rest of his miserable life. He deserves it for killing Hodr.”

Thor barely keeps from scoffing. “Hodr was a blind idiot. He was weak. It was a mercy to kill him so young.”

“He was my _brother_.”

Thor is quiet for a long time. Something unpleasant eats away at him, something like envy.

“I’m your brother, too.” He says caustically.

“No. Not really. Hodr was just like me. He _looked_ just like me. And we shared the same mother, and the same womb. We had our own language. Sometimes, I would just _think_ something, and he would say it aloud. You don’t look like me at all. I don’t even _know_ who your mother was. And I can't ever guess at what you’re thinking. You’re scary, Thor. You scare people. You’re too much like Odin.”

They have hoods on their faces when they get to the burning. The tension in the air is palpable, hate and jealousy and fear coming out of every pore. The townspeople are ready to see the girls hanged. The crowd is a live thing, pushing and pulling like a tide, swaying back and forth and side to side, and all three of them are caught in it.

“Why do they hate them so much?” Thor asks Odin, staring curiously at the hunger on their faces, the hunger for blood.

“Because they are awful, vile things.” Odin tells him, his voice like gravel, looking down at him with his one good eye. And there is so much hate in his voice, Thor wonders at how he does not choke on it. “They leave chaos in their wake. They destroy everything they touch.”

Thor stares at the girls on the pyres, all fairly young and beautiful.

“I don’t understand. They’re very pretty. What could they have done wrong?”

Odin points, and Thor’s gaze follows.

“The one on the left, she caused a boy to kill himself. The girl in the middle seduced her step father. The woman on the right left her husband and he drowned their children. Witches inspire such a wickedness, Thor. They cannot help it. God has not given them a soul. But for their actions, they must burn.”

Thor only stares at his father, uncomprehending. Baldr, who stands besides him, looks queasy.

“But father, they didn’t do anything. It was the men who did it to themselves.”

“Thor,” Odin snaps, blue eye like a storm, displeasure evident on his face. “Are you perhaps an idiot like Hodr was? Must I drown you as well? It was a witches spell that caused such evil. The men had no control.”

But still, Thor cannot see how anyone could make someone else do such a thing.

 _They must’ve been weak_ , Thor thinks, staring at the witches on the pyre, _if such girls could manipulate them so. And these girls too are weak, if they could allow such people to tie them up. If all they can do now is plead and beg and cry for help – how weak they truly are._

“Father, surely,” Thor says, slightly disappointed, “these are not real witches?”

And Odin turns to him in a fury, one eye an intense electric blue, and Thor hears the sky crackle with lighting.

“Do not let appearances fool you, Thor. Sometimes the prettiest things have the sharpest teeth. These woman are more dangerous than you know. Look upon their faces. They are the plague of the world.”

Thor thinks of the great churches of Vanaheim, and wonders if the witches there are the same. _Is that all they can do? Seduce step fathers and leave their husbands?_

When the townspeople set fire to the pyres, Thor waits. He waits for some grand demonstration of a _true_ witch, for one of the girls to cut away at her bonds with a flick of the hand and fly at them with wings of fire and cast a curse on them all. But nothing happens, and soon the fire is up to their waists, and _still_ all they do is cry and scream for help, and then Baldr throws up, and Thor realizes

_They’re not going to do anything. This is the extent of their abilities. Seducing men. Witches truly aren’t fearsome at all._

So for a long time, Thor doesn’t think much of witches, and his father’s obsession in hunting them down, so in contrast with his apathy for anything that isn’t conquering realms.

He doesn’t think much of witches, that is, until he meets Loki.

-

“There are rumors.” Hogun tells him in one of the empty council rooms.

Thor, looking over a map of Svartalfheim, does not bother looking up.

“What rumors?”

“Witch rumors.”

Thor barely keeps from rolling his eyes. “There are always witch rumors.”

“This is different. This time it has to do with Grimstad.”

Thor pauses in his surveying of Svartalfheim. “Grimstad?” he asks instead.

Grimstad is a town on the outer reaches of Asgard where a cult of witches has always been rumored to live. There are plenty of horror stories about it as well as warnings to the lonesome traveler, but Thor believes it more likely to be home to a den of outlaws and thieves than witches.

Hogun continues. “A group of men came to me the other day. They wanted to plead their case to one of the princes, or even the All-father if they could. They were lumberjacks hoping to get to Oslo, a big group of about 20 strong, when they fell under a sickness of some kind. They stopped in Grimstad and claimed there were many beautiful woman there who helped them to recover at first, but then started sacrificing them at some sort of altar. Only five of them managed to get out alive.”

“…sacrificed at an altar?”

Hogun nods gravely. “That’s what they said.”

Thor turns on his heel and pours himself a glass of rum.

“I don’t know what to believe.”

“Your Highness,” Hogun starts hesitantly, “if I may? This is not the first rumor of it’s kind from Grimstad. Many people have traveled there never to return. It seems that the witches target healthy, hardy men.”

“Really?” Thor asks, taking a sip of his wine. “How amusing.”

“Yes – wait – your highness?”

“It’s amusing because I very highly doubt a group of women is responsible for the disappearance of 15 men. Most likely those men got robbed by some bandits and are too ashamed to admit it, so they blame it on witchery, the fools.” Thor pauses. “Still, this has political ramifications.” Thor traces his fingers over a map of Asgard and its conquered realms until he’s found Grimstad.

“I’ll investigate the matter myself. Tomorrow.”

Hogun blinks. “Tomorrow? But my lord tomorrow is…”

“My brother Kustaa’s birthday?” Thor raises one unimpressed eyebrow. “Hogun…let me ask you…what is the point of celebrating someone’s birthday when they’re living on borrowed time?”

Hogun’s mouth opens and closes like a fish, unable to respond to such a blunt and treasonous statement, and Thor laughs.

“Forget it. Consider this matter settled. I will leave in the morning.”

Thor leaves the chambers, and makes as if to go to his quarters, but instead turns in the direction of the knights training yards.

He finds the knight named Vikter, and hands him a bag with enough aster to kill a horse.

Thor smiles at the young soldier.

“Tell him I said sweet dreams.”

-

Thor leaves with three men.

 _It is far too little_ , says Hogun. _You’ll be sieged_ , warns Volstagg. _You’ll die out there_ , promises Fandral.

Thor listens to none of them. Thor listens to no one, all of the time. That they thought he would listen now is foolish.

Either way, Thor is convinced the town is just a hot bed for criminals. And even if it is a rat’s nest of witches, Thor has met witches before. And they are not impressive.

His men, on the other hand, are scared and he can tell. The closer they get to Grimstad, the more they twitch and startle their horses into anxiousness, and the more they mutter gibberish under their breaths to the Gods.

Grimstad is a quiet place. According to the map, they are already here, but there is nothing but dark woods. No town hall, no plumes of smoke, no buildings or clearings in sight. In fact, the air is unnaturally still. No song birds singing. No whistle of the wind.

It puts his men even more on edge.

“My lord – surely it was a jest.” One of them stutters out. “There is nothing here.”

Thor glances at him lazily. “If there was nothing here, Vestar, people wouldn’t be disappearing. I chose you because I thought you would be able to handle this. Show me I chose correctly.”

Vestar is quiet after that. They are all quiet after that. The more time passes and nothing happens, the more comfortable they become. Even Thor is starting wonder if he has been led on a fool’s errand.

And then he sees it. A figure standing in the shadow of the woods, before twisting and turning away.

Gone.

Thor kicks his horse into following.

And then he is gone as well.

-

“It’s a full moon today.” Says Herkja.

Loki barely keeps from sighing. A full moon means he’s turned into a girl, whether he likes it or not. He pats down his dress and swipes a piece of chocolate when Herkja’s not looking.

“I’m aware.”

“You’re sixteen already. It’s time.”

Loki casts his eyes down from her iron gaze and fiddles with the hem of his sleeve.

“I’m aware.”

Herkja grabs him by the chin with one gnarled hand and forces him to look at her.

“For you to take a man. It’s time, boy. You’ve been a burden long enough.”

Herkja spits the word boy like she does man. Like they’re both equally cursed, like they’re both equally plagues upon the world. The coven has always hated him for the way he was born.

Loki wrenches himself away from her grasp, all spindly limbs and sharp edges. Barely sixteen and he still has a baby face, is stretched too thin everywhere, looks like a young colt ready to run at the smallest sound. He is graceless, has the face of a girl, but the body of a boy, and the coven will never forgiven him for it.

“I said I know already!” He snaps, breaking away from her hold.

“Wretched thing you are,” Herkja sneers, staring at him in disgust. “A boy. Soon to become something even more wretched - a man. If it weren’t for the fact that – _miracle of all miracles!_ \- you had our gift – we would have drowned you ages ago. You’re the reason your mother died. Farbauti, that fool. Fell in love with a man. _Had you_. We almost died because of that lover she had – because of her. She broke coven rules. She had to die.”

Loki blinks back angry tears. It’s not a story he hasn’t heard before but it still hurts all the same. His mother’s betrayal of the coven. The way they killed her because of a man. And of course, the fact that his own existence was a burden to the coven – a disgrace. Not only because of his gender but because of his Jotunheim parentage.

Hurt, and backed into a corner, Loki’s hackles rise.

“And what of you, Herkja? You act like you are Lilith’s gift to the world. Wretched _crone_. At least I’m not ugly like you! Like the rest of the coven! All of you need the full moon to become young and beautiful but not _me._ I already am.”

Herkja laughs something sharp. “Silly child. Only women can be beautiful. And you are a boy. You are the most wretched of us all. Though the moon hides it well, it cannot change that.”

Loki feels his eyes burn. He snarls at Herkja and makes to leave her hut when, with a wave of her hand, she slams him into the wall.

The breath is knocked out of him.

Herkja glides over to him with a grace that looks unnatural on an old woman like her, and reaches into the pocket of his breeches, holding the chocolate in his face like an accusation.

She slaps him hard across the face. Her black and rotten teeth are bared in a snarl when she says

“Never steal from me again. Or the next time will be far worse. Understand?”

Loki, too proud to say anything, remains silent, until he feels the invisible knife of Herkja’s powers pressing up against his throat, and nods his head in acquiesce.

Herkja takes away some of the pressure. Her eyes glitter maliciously when she says

“What was that?”

Loki bites the inside of his cheek before he answers.

“Yes, sister. I understand.”

Loki drops to the ground in a heap.

“Now leave and go back to your part of the woods. You know the coven doesn’t like it when you loiter here, boy.”

So Loki leaves. Biting down on his tongue, mind in a fury, he storms out of Herkja’s house, his hands curled into two fists, nails digging into his skin and drawing blood.

“And don’t forget you must take a man!”

“Of course I know, you ugly crone.” Loki mutters under his breath, not bothering to look back.

_Under a full moon_

_You must draw blood_

_Seduce and swoon_

_Man’s treasured son_

_Get your boon_

_When you bury him in the mud_

_Power becomes you_

_My chosen one_

He stomps through the woods in anger, the woods creaking under the wave of it, leaves and twigs snapping beneath his feet.

His anger feels too big for his body. His throat is too tight.

Loki has never fit in with the coven. Ever. From the minute he first drew breath, he was a curse.

Herkja was the leader of all of them. Oh yes, there was an elected council, a panel of woman to decide on other things, but when it came down to the bullet it was only Herkja’s opinions that mattered. And it wasn’t for nothing either. Because Herkja was a war witch.

Captured in by slave traders in a raid when she was only seven, she was forced to Vanaheim, into the deadliest of war witch churches.

The Church of Nine Dead Men.

Loki does not know much about witches outside his coven, but Herkja assures him not one is the same. The church of nine dead men was a sort of a coven, if larger than usual covens. Girls forced from a young age to learn the darkest of blood magic and how to manipulate nature’s laws. To become hired assassins for kings and queens and kingdoms.

Herkja does not speak much about her days in the church of nine dead men, or even her escape from it, but one look at her body tells you enough. The scars on her back from a whip. The various cuts on her arms from using blood magic. The way sometimes, her arm simply doesn’t work right, or her hip bone seems to jut out awkwardly.

Herkja has eyes filled with the horrors of the world.

What Loki does know, what everyone knows, is how Herkja formed the coven, picking up the outcasts and pariahs of every town she passed through. And how she taught them one of the wickedest ways of staying young, courtesy of the church of nine dead men.

“There are ugly things they teach you, ways to amplify your power that go against the laws of nature. The church teaches these things in case a witch is ever forced into an unfavorable situation. Some ways include taking something from yourself. Whether that be a treasured memory, a finger, an eye, blood. But they have taken so much from me already. All of them, every realm, every man in every realm, has taken so much from us. We will not give them anything else. There is another way.”

“Taking a life also grants you power. The church only tells you this when you are far in your training. When you already have kills under your belt, and they think you sufficiently under their thumb. They teach you that witches are descendants of the succubus. That by fucking a man, and taking his life, you would achieve more power than you would than simply taking from yourself. This is the churches most guarded secret. They keep it thus so that they are not in danger of being overcome. And this secret I give to you as proof of my love – the secret to living forever.”

When Herkja found Loki’s mother, the coven had already been formed. Herkja had taken Farbauti under her wing. But then Farbauti met Loki’s father, a giant from Jotunheim, known for their dual sex, and had Loki.

There are very few rules in the coven. But the most important one is no relations with men besides sleeping with them. It goes without saying that falling in love with one and having its child is a big no-no. Even worse, telling that man you’re a witch and about your coven is grounds for treason.

So they killed Loki’s father. And after Loki was born, they drowned Loki’s mother.

_Men are a curse. Men are a plague. There is no man on this earth who does not want to keep us in chains._

When the coven saw that Loki was a boy they were going to drown him. There are no male witches. It’s a female trait. But because of Loki’s dual sex he was able to express the trait that gifted him with seidr.

It saved his life, but not much else. The coven still hated men. The coven still hated him.

And there has not been a moment in his life when they have not made this known.

“I spent my whole life killing men. How is this any different?”

This is Herkja’s philosophy. Her justification for everything the coven does. Just a couple weeks ago, loggers came into Grimstad on a full moon. Because of some blood magic Herkja long ago cast, every witch in the coven turns young and beautiful on a full moon. For Loki, it turns him into a girl, getting rid of any of the markers that may say otherwise.

“It is a marker,” Herkja says. “Every coven has one. This marker tells the world we are the Grimstad coven. I knew one coven that turned to wolves on the full moon and terrorized villages. It distinguishes us.”

On the day the loggers came, Herkja came to his cabin on the far outer reaches of the coven’s compound with a man.

Her grey hair had turned into a deep auburn. Her rotted teeth had turned white and straight. A low cut dress revealed her big bosom, which Loki knew in truth was saggier than a bag of potatoes.

Herkja had smiled at him. Acting. Putting on a show for the man whose beefy arm she was under.

“Astrid! We were looking for you!” Herkja said in high and girly voice. Loki would never get use to the way she acted on a full moon. “This very nice man, Igor, is lonely. There aren’t enough girls for him at the compound. Could he play with you for a bit?”

Igor was a very big man. Though age was a strange concept to Loki, Igor seemed to be around the age of somebody’s father. He had a face full of hair and his cheeks were the ruddy red you got from drinking.

Igor reached a hand out to thread through Loki’s hair, and Loki flinched back hard.

Igor laughed abruptly. “Jumpy little thing, are ya? You’re very small. I could break you in half easy.”

Loki sneered, not liking his tone at all. “You think you could break _me_ in half? You sack of potatoes hairy looking _ape_ -“

“Astrid!” Herkja snapped, not looking amused in the least. Igor’s face colored dangerously. “He’s a guest. Remember, we are _polite_ to our guests.”

“Oh yes,” Loki smiled back thinly, “we are _very_ polite.”

Herkja pulled Loki aside after that, excusing herself from Igor as sweetly as she could.

“What is wrong with you?” Herkja hissed, her gunmetal grey eyes flashing. “Is this a game to you? Do you want this man to find out what we truly are? You are sixteen, Loki. You _will_ take a man.”

Loki pulls his wrist from her tight grasp. “I will not lay with that brute. When he lays on top of me it will be like lying under a boulder. I will asphyxiate and die before I can take what I need from him. And he’s ugly.”

“You do not get to be _picky_ , Loki.” Herkja sneers. “This is not about liking. This is not about love. It is about power.”

“I don’t _want_ to-“

Herkja sticks her finger into Loki’s eye and the only reason he doesn’t scream is because she covers his mouth.

“When have I ever, _ever_ , cared about what you want, child? You will do what I say, because I say it. Or must I punish you as I did when you were a child? When I gouged out both your eyes, and then grew them back, painfully?”

Herkja presses harder, and Loki feels the phantom pains, remembers the way the hot poker felt going through his eye, cries out-

“I’ll do it next time! With the next batch, I’ll take a man then. But please, _please_. Don’t take my eyes again. Please.”

Herkja lets go of him and Loki almost sobs in relief.

“It’s a promise then.” Herkja says, staring coldly at him. “When the next batch comes you will take one. Or I will take your eyes _and_ pull out your teeth one by one.”

-

Loki does not know what happens to the men during these nights.

But he hears their screams.

-

Loki stomps back to his cabin, upset, and his hair obnoxiously getting in his face.

It’s one of the things he hates worst of his female form – the long tangled curls that trail wildly behind him.

It’s during this stomping that a horse rushes past and Loki nearly dies right then from the fright.

The horse is a black darker than night, with hoofs nearly the size of Loki’s head, and a height that could topple most of the village’s huts.

The horse bristles his snout in frustration, pacing back and forth on the edge of the woods that surround their village, and that’s when Loki realizes he must’ve lost his rider.

 _The Exterreri_. The Dark forest. It’s a forest Herkja grew with her own blood. It’s unnatural. Nothing living lives there. The forest protects Grimstad from the real world, and only lets in who Herkja wants to let in. Those who go in without her blessing see their worst nightmares come to life.

Most men go mad trying to break out of it.

 _Has exterreri claimed another victim?_ Loki wonders curiously.

But usually, the forest almost seems to swell when fresh blood is split. Right now, it still looks dark and sullen.

The horse paces back and forth at the same spot at the edge of the forest, it’s snout pushing at something Loki can't see from the distance.

_Perhaps…? Is it possible…?_

Loki walks slowly to where the horse is at, his ears twitching to hear any sound whatsoever.

But there is no sound other than the whining of the horse, no sound of rustling or moment, so Loki walks up more confidently.

…only to stop dead in his tracks when he sees a boy.

Except boy is not the right word. Loki is a boy. This – this _male_ – is not a boy. But neither is he a man, like the men the coven always takes. Loki has never seen a male quite like this before.

He is sturdy built like the men the coven usually takes, but more lithe. The loggers, though they always had more muscles than Loki would ever have in his lifetime, always had fat faces and protruding guts. They also had lines on their foreheads, and wrinkles around their eyes when they smiled.

This male has no lines anywhere. No markings of that older age. Neither does he have facial hair. But he is older than Loki. Is bigger than Loki. Has a defined jaw and none of the softness that Loki has.

He is also incredibly handsome.

When he’s absolutely sure the boy is unconscious, Loki moves closer, finally bending to his level to get a closer look. His hands trace over the cupid’s bow of the boy’s lips, then follow his high cheekbones, only to end up trailing through his golden hair.

Loki admires the quality and color of it, so distinct from his own.

 _It’s like the sun itself decided to sit upon his head_ , Loki marvels.

But that’s not the only thing Loki notices.

Loki places his hand, unconsciously, on the boys abdomen, then recoils quickly when his hand touches something wet.

_Blood._

Its only then that Loki notices the other things, like how his ankle is bent at a strange angle, and the cut on the back of his head that is bleeding onto the leaves behind him.

 _The forest must have tried to keep him_ , Loki thinks grimly. And sure enough the injury on the boy’s abdomen has an exit wound, as if a branch cut him clear through.

The boy’s face is dangerously pale, and when Loki slaps him across the face to wake him, it seems to do about the same good as slapping a dead fish across the face.

 _I could give him back to the forest_ , Loki considers, biting his lip, and the trees seem to shiver in agreement.

 _Yes._ The trees whisper. _Give him back, useless boy. We are owed a meal._

Loki bristles at the attitude a mere _forest_ seems fit to give him.

“I don’t owe you anything. Do I look like your mother? Go complain to Herkja if you’re so hungry.”

The forest creaks and snaps angrily in response. Loki ignores it.

 _I could fix him, couldn’t I?_ Loki wonders, gently pushing back a golden lock. _The sisters have trained me well. And I have grown back every toe and finger and eye Herkja has ever stolen from me. This can’t be too different. And besides, I wouldn’t have to fix him up_ too _much. If I take him as my own for the full moon…_

Loki stares at the blond, considering.

“You are very handsome,” Loki says out loud, pushing back another lock of hair. “Surely handsome enough a match for me. And you wouldn’t crush me if we laid together, as those loggers surely would. I’ll seduce you first. Then, we when lay together, I’ll slit your throat and you’ll be too weak to fight back.”

Its only as Loki says the words, that he realizes how flawless his plan is.

Loki cups the blonds face between his hands and smiles.

“Oh my. You’re perfect.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UH OH! An injured Thor is in the clutches of a dangerous witch!
> 
> What will happen next??!
> 
> Find out in 7 days!


	4. Fever Dreams

Loki doesn’t think boy fits the blond so he decides to name him Golden, after his hair.

Loki uses a featherlight charm to bring Golden back to his hut. Golden’s horse trails anxiously behind Loki, worried for his owner. Loki can't help but find it charming.

“Such a good boy you are,” Loki gushes at the horse, petting its snout. “Such a loyal horse.” It’s only until the horse tries to eat his hair that he recoils.

“Ugh!” he curls his lip, disgusted. “You’ve covered my hair in _saliva_. If you were so hungry all you had to do was say so.”

Loki brings the horse green apples and then goes back inside to tend to Golden.

There’s only one bed in his hut so he’s forced to place Golden there.

And so begin the horrors of healing.

-

Thor dreams.

It’s the forest, he knows, that made him dream first.

He thought he saw in a child in those woods so he kicked his horse into following and that’s when everything took a turn for the worse.

It felt like the forest was trying to swallow him whole. The trees all pressed closer to him, creaking and whining, his horse Nike getting spooked at the lack of space.

Thor sees a flash of blonde hair, a child, and pushes Nike in that direction.

But everywhere Thor looks, there is no sign of a child. Only endless woods, toothpick thin, so that Thor can see there is nothing living for miles.

Then a wind blows in and that’s when the voices start. Whispers hear and there that have Thor whipping his head side to side, looking for the source.

“Its just the wind making sound through the trees, you raving lunatic,” Thor mutters to himself.

“That’s what you’d like to think, isn’t it Thor?”

An ice cold feeling rushes through his blood.

Thor turns Nike in a circle, but he still can't see anything.

“Tyr.” Thor would recognize that voice anywhere. “I know it’s you. Where are you hiding?”

Had this all been a trap? But Hogun’s family has always been loyal. They were one of the first noble families to support his claim to the throne. But how else could this be explained? Hogun was the one who told him about Grimstad, about the supposed “witches.” He _knew_ Thor would try to clear the baseless rumors. Was Tyr counting on this as well? Has Thor fallen completely into Tyr’s trap?

“Just like when I lost you in the woods all those years ago. You’d _like_ to think it was a mistake. But we both know what I was really trying to do, don’t we, Thor?”

The voice comes from behind him. Thor turns around Nike sharply, but still finds no one.

It feels like the forest has become substantially colder. Thor feels his unease build.

“Tyr,” he snarls into the wind. “You know how I abhor games. We are not Vali and Vidar. We have always faced each other frankly.”

A chilling laughter echoes through the forest.

“Maybe Vali and Vidar had it right.” A voice says behind his ear.

Thor turns sharply, and once again, there is nothing there.

“Maybe I should string you up like a deer and act like I thought you were game.”

Thor turns, and finally, there is Tyr, only a couple paces in front of him, holding a horses reigns, a blonde boy slung over his horses back, a dozen arrows shot through his back.

Tyr smiles a ghostly smile. “Hello, Thor.”

He knocks the blonde boy off his horse and Thor recoils in disbelief when he sees the blonde child is him. That it is Thor there, at eight years old, blood coming out his mouth, blue eyes like a dolls, staring lifelessly at the sky.

And then with another blink of the eye, Tyr is right in front of him, a knife in his hand, and a snarl on his face.

“I’m going to do what I should’ve done years ago.”

Nike rears up in surprise and that is the only thing that saves Thor. She bursts forward, running through the woods haphazardly, branches whipping across Thor’s face, leaving stinging cuts that bloom red.

Thor himself is dazed, is barely cognizant of his hands gripping tightly on the reigns.

_I don’t understand? How could it be me? How could Tyr have been in front of me so quickly? How could I have been lying there dead?_

Nike is still running at a break neck speed, Thor pushing her even faster, until one branch cuts through his stomach and Thor is thrown off his horse.

And that’s when the dreams begin.

-

First it is Jotunheim.

_(of course it is jotunheim. it was his first ever campaign)_

Odin sends him there against his protests. It’s not that Thor’s afraid, but he doesn’t want to campaign in the same place Tyr has already been campaigning for years. Especially when none of his other brothers are there. Tyr will focus all his hatred on him and it will be Hel.

Sure enough it is. The men worship Tyr there, and this makes him their de facto leader. This means Tyr can choose what chores Thor will be assigned in the camp, and when his lunch time will be, and what missions he will be allowed to go on.

Tyr gives Thor the latest lunch time. This means there is barely any food left when he goes to eat.

Tyr also puts Thor on clean up duty. This means pulling any dead bodies into the pit and covering them in sulfur powder so that they burn fast. Even more than battle, Thor spends most his days in the pit, crawling over dead bodies with maggots and flies and rats, the bodies so frozen that sometimes Thor’s foot would break through a skull on accident.

He’s lucky for the cold at least. Even if he almost gets frostbite one day. Because at least with the cold, there is no spoiling meat, no smell of rot. Only the sunken eyes of the giants, their bodies mangled and in pieces, their genitalia shriveled and deflated.

Even more than battle, Thor dreams about the pit. Tyr has him on the longest watch, right in the middle of the night, and this means Thor barely gets any sleep, along with barely getting enough food. For the few years he is in Jotunheim, Thor can count each and every of his ribs, and when he goes to sleep, all he can see are the faces of the dead in the pit, their hands reaching for him.

It’s a wonder he doesn’t go crazy then.

In his dreams of Jotunheim, most of all, he sees Tyr, blood on his sword, staring at him with his black eyes.

“You shouldn’t have come here.” He says.

“You shouldn’t have come.”

-

His dreams of Svartalfheim are different. Hold different horrors.

When Odin sends him to another realm, for another of his campaigns, Thor is relieved.

In Svartalfheim, Thor flourishes. He is the de facto leader there. His other brothers have not been there before him, so Thor finds it easy to get a foothold. For a long time that’s how it is – Thor alone in Svartalfheim. Some of his brothers come later, sent by Odin, but the men are already loyal to Thor so they all leave quickly.

Svartalfheim is deemed impossible. Impossible a conquest, even more so than Jotunheim was.

But for Odin the Matchless, there is no such thing as impossible.

“If you win Svartalfheim,” Odin tells him before he leaves, “the throne will be assured. No one has ever captured Svartalfheim.”

Svartalfheim is ruled by dark elves. Unlike Jotunheim, the battle field is not equal. While in Jotunheim force was used against force, in Svartalfheim, force is used against sorcery. And since in Asgard it is prohibited to use seidr…

“You will never win Svartalfheim,” Tyr says to him, laughing, when he leaves Jotunheim. “You will die there boy. And I will piss on your grave.”

But then Thor wipes out an entire battalion and kills their top lieutenant. And then the entire narrative changes. Svartalfheim is no longer impossible.

And Tyr is no longer laughing.

-

After two days, Golden’s fever breaks.

Two horrible days, where all Golden does is scream in his sleep, and Loki lays on the floor just listening to him.

 _What does he dream about, that he screams so terribly?_ Loki wonders, staring at the ceiling with twitching eyes.

“For such a handsome boy you know many horrors, don’t you?” Loki murmurs to him one day, wiping down his forehead with a cold compress.

Loki uses different herbs and sap to cover the wound on his stomach, and cleans it using antiseptic techniques. He grinds down belladonna with his blood to make it heal faster, and then covers it with a bandage.

For Golden’s broken ankle Loki twists it back into place using seidr and then sets it with a stick so that it can heal properly. He uses honey for his cuts because he can't find any turmeric, even thought it kills him to do so since Herkja is so stingy with giving him sweets.

“Oh, the lengths I’m going for you, Golden.” Loki sighs, combing his fingers through Golden’s hair. “I hope you are properly thankful when you wake.”

But Golden is not properly thankful.

-

Thor is dreaming about the battalion again, heads stuck on pikes and blood magic when he wakes, staring directly into the greenest eyes he has ever seen.

Black sable hair tightly coiled frames the girl’s face like the fiercest of waves, trailing all the way down her back. She has cat-like eyes and baby lips, her face narrow and delicate. It must be night time judging by the dark that permeates the house, oil lamps casting shadows on the walls, and all the girl wears is a thin night shift, a ghostly white that is worn at the collar, slipping off one shoulder, the peak of her nipples evident through the sheer cloth.

The girl is frozen in the act of wiping him down with a wet rag and Thor takes advantage of the situation by grabbing her by the wrist.

“What are you doing?”

The girl blinks at him dumbly, her lashes so long they cast spindly shadows under her eyes.

“You had a fever,” the girl blinks again. “I was trying to bring it down.”

“Where am I? Who are you?”

“This is Grimstad,” the girl says slowly. “And I am…Astrid.”

Thor stares at her hard, and the girl looks down at his sharp gaze. “Astrid is a pagan name. I will call you Ase.”

Ase looks up sharply at this, her green eyes locking onto his. “My _name_ is Astrid.”

Thor laughs callously. “We both know that’s not your real name.”

Thor saw Tyr in the woods, he’s sure of it. The rest, he can't quite explain, but what else could it be? Thor is a firm believer in logic. If he saw Tyr, then he must have been there. And this must be one of his spies, sent to kill him once and for all.

The girl recoils, obviously startled, Thor’s suspicions confirmed.

“How much did Tyr pay you, hm? And how long till you kill me?”

“I-I _saved_ you.” Ase stutters. “Why would I go through the hassle of bringing you back to life just to kill you again?”

“You saved me? How do I know that? Here I lie, completely at your mercy. Is this what you call saving? I saw Tyr in the woods. There’s no need to pretend.”

Understanding bleeds through the green of Ase’s eyes, as if she’s finally realizing something.

“You saw him in the forest? Who is this Tyr you speak of?”

Thor raises an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Are we really going to pretend? Really? Tyr is my brother. And Tyr, like the rest of my brothers, wishes for nothing more than for me to be dead.”

“Golden, that man was not your brother.”

Thor’s eyes almost bulge out of his head. “Excuse me? What was that you called me?”

Ase’s cheeks flush. “I meant- I’m sorry. I don’t know your name. So…” She stares at his hair, making it quite obvious what the moniker was in reference too.

_Acting as if she doesn’t know my name. Funny. But I’ll play along._

“My name is Thor. And what do you mean that man wasn’t my brother? How would you know?”

“That forest is enchanted, Thor,” and Ase says his name carefully, as if testing it on her mouth. “By blood magic, a long time ago by a witch. It shows you your worst nightmares.”

Thor feels an ugly flush descend on his face. “I do not _fear_ my brother,” he snarls.

Ase is startled by his anger. “It could simply be a certain memory you have _with_ your brother. It need not be your brother himself.”

_(his small eight year old body, thrown over tyr’s horse like dead game, pierced with arrows, his eyes hollow and empty like a stuffed animals)_

Thor brushes off the image.

“Enchanted, you say? If it were so, then that means there are witches here.” Thor turns a sharp eye on her. “For all I know, you could be a witch as well.”

Thor only means it as a jest. The idea is so fool hardy in fact, that he means it sarcastically.

But the girl becomes upset.

“I am not a witch!” She spits, eyes glowing madly. “And there are no witches here! All I said is that one left an enchantment here long ago. I’ve seen many a men succumb to it. They go mad in there, and most wind up dead. You’re the first I’ve ever seen to make it out alive.”

“Then you are a spy,” Thor snarls, unable to hold back his anger. “And a stupid one. What did Tyr promise you, hm? Wealth? Status? Or wait,” Thor smiles cruelly, traces her jaw gently with one hand. “You’re very pretty. You look like one of his little lovesick followers. Don’t tell me he promised to make you his mistress once he received his title?”

For such a small hand, her slap is not so small. Thor feels the sting on his skin long after her hand is gone.

“You dare,” Ase says, green eyes like fire, “ _insult_ me, when I have saved your life? You useless, _useless_ **boy**? I am not a spy,” and Ase spits out the word like it’s poison, “but you are right when you say that you are at my mercy. So I would be careful with my words if I were you.”

And then Ase is gone without another word, her raven hair swinging behind her.

-

The next days are tense. It is obvious that this boy, Thor, does not trust her.

Loki cannot believe his rudeness, or even his wild ravings about him being a spy.

_In what kind of world does this boy live that he believes spies are after him? And even worse than that, that his own brothers have sent spies after him? What kind of ego-centric maniac world has he created in his mind?_

_Should I have just left him to die? It such a pain looking after him, especially when he doesn’t trust me. How am I supposed to seduce a boy who doesn’t even want to be close to me? Who looks at me like I’m a trap ready to spring?_

Loki glares at the boy from her kitchen, making oatmeal.

_And now, he lays on my cot while I’m to attend him as both his nurse and maid? What a horrible turn of events._

Thor, simply laying on the cot, looks up as if sensing Loki’s heated stare and glares back.

-

Loki sets the bowl of oatmeal on a small table between them. He places his own bowl of oatmeal on his lap and begins to eat.

Thor simply stares.

“Are you not going to eat?” Loki says through his food, pointing at Thor’s bowl with his spoon.

Thor makes a sound of disgust.

“No, I’m not going to eat. And close your mouth when you _talk_. How do I know you haven’t poisoned the oatmeal?”

Loki barely keeps from rolling his eyes. He sticks his own spoon in Thor’s oatmeal and takes a bite. Once he’s swallowed he looks at Thor pointedly.

“There. Now you know its not poisoned.”

Thor sits up to take a bite and winces.

_Nine hells. How could I be so stupid?_

Loki finishes his oatmeal quickly and then brings Thor’s bowl to him.

Thor makes a sour look.

“Don’t be such a baby,” Loki tsks. “You’re not well enough to feed yourself. I’ll feed you.”

“I don’t want you to feed me,” Thor snarls. “I’m not an invalid. I can do it myself if you just pass me my bowl.”

“Fine,” Loki snaps back. “Have it your way,” he sniffs, and passes Thor the bowl.

Thor makes it to three spoonful’s before he starts making faces and Loki takes the bowl away.

“What did I tell you?” Loki rebukes. “You should’ve listened to me.”

Loki raises his hands to clip back his hair and Thor stares.

Loki sneers back self consciously. “Why are you looking at me like that?” He barks. “Stop.”

“Sorry,” Thor murmurs, before dropping his gaze.

Loki leans forward to spoon food him. He can't help but tease.

“Here comes the airplane,” he coos exaggeratedly, making baby faces and waving the spoon like a Midgardian airplane. “Say ahhhh.”

Loki makes to shove the spoon in Thor’s mouth but Thor moves his face away, his jaw clenched tight.

“I am not a child,” he says through gritted teeth. “Do not condescend.”

Loki puts one hand on his hip, the other still holding the spoon casually.

“You want to eat don’t you?”

“Not so much that I would let you disrespect me in such a manner.”

Loki narrows his eyes. “You either say _ah_ or I don’t feed you. It’s that simple.”

Theirs is a long stalemate where they simply stare at each other, until finally the fight seems to go out of Thor, and he resigns himself to the situation.

His face is carefully blank.

“Fine,” he says plainly. He opens his mouth. “Ahhhh,” he goes, in total monotone, and Loki can barely keep from laughing.

He moves forward to spoon feed Thor and in the next second Thor has a knife held against his throat, his other arm wrapped tightly across Loki’s waist, Loki’s back to Thor’s front.

“You think this is funny, you dirty fucking whore?” Thor snarls. “I think I know now why you’re so pretty, not for Tyr, but for me. He wanted to give me a doll, didn’t he? He thought I wouldn’t suspect you. Because dolls have empty heads and glass eyes.” Thor presses the knife tighter against his throat, draws blood. “Maybe that’s the case but I think my dear brother forgot that dolls are also very easy to _break_.”

Loki’s pulse races. His mind is so blank with shock at the action that a boy virtually at his mercy was able to undertake, that the use of his seidr doesn’t even come to mind.

_But Herkja said men were all fools! That they blundered their way into success, with their sheer size and force! And yet this awful boy has tricked me? He’s even stolen one of my knives?!_

“Tell me where Tyr is,” Thor snarls into his ear. “Tell me what he’s planning. Is he going to take Svartalfheim from me?”

When Loki doesn’t answer, Thor presses the knife even deeper.

“ _Tell me!”_ He commands, and Loki breaks.

“I don’t know! I don’t know I don’t know I don’t KNOW!”

Loki’s seidr flares up and causes the handle of Thor’s knife to overheat. He screams and drops the knife and Loki uses the opportunity to throw his elbow back, breaking out of Thor’s hold and taking back the knife.

“You are an awful AWFUL _boy!_ ” Loki yells, tears in his eyes, holding the knife menacingly in front of Thor’s face.

Thor, for his part, is completely neutral. As if this was just another regular day for him.

“Are you going to kill me now?” He asks, casual as can be.

Loki nearly screams from the frustration. “I saved you, you STUPID OX! I am _not_ going to kill you!”

 _Not yet_ , says another, darker, deeper part of him, but Loki ignores it.

Thor looks unimpressed at his declaration.

“You’re going to maintain this farce? Fine then. I may be a cripple, but you try _anything_ ,” Thor says, face darkening, “and next time I’ll kill you.”

Thor leans back on Loki’s cot.

“You may be a spy, Ase,” he says casually, “but you are yet a child. I have been in this realm far longer than you. I’ve had a longer time to deal with all the horrors of this world.”

-

Loki runs to the outhouse and throws up. His hands are shaking so bad that the knife falls from his hands and clatters into the sink. When he looks up at the mirror, his face is paler than a ghost’s.

_How could he do that to me? I thought this was going to be easy. It should’ve been easy. He’s a man. Men are stupid. And above all, he can't even walk. So how’d he take a knife when I wasn’t watching? How could he look so casual right before he grabbed me? It should’ve been written all over his face, the violence he wanted to inflict on me. But he was so good at hiding I didn’t even see it. There was not a single indicator from his body language that he was going to attack._

And that’s what Loki fears most right now. The idea that he might be way in over his head. Thor is good at hiding what he feels and what he’s thinking. How can a man be so viciously intelligent, if Herkja has said all the opposite for all these years?

 _But it was a man who chained her, wasn’t it?_ Loki thinks. _So there must be some. There must be some men that are like snakes, who trap you without even blinking an eye._

Loki stares at his reflection in the mirror, raises his hand to touch the cut on his neck.

His hand comes back stained a deep red.

_I thought I was untouchable. Because I had seidr, and he was simply a man._

But Thor isn’t a man is he? Not like other men, anyway. And neither is he a boy.

He is something different.

Loki considers the situation as he cleans his cut.

_I wish I never brought him into my hut. I wish I never saved him from the edge of the woods. But I did, didn’t I?_

Loki looks into the mirror with grim resolve.

_And it’s too late to turn back now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i might have loki using both he/and her pronouns when it's his pov. or is that too confusing? should i just stick to he? i tried it in this chapter, using both. tell me if it's yay or nay.
> 
> might update quicker depending on the response!  
> love yall! lmk your thoughts
> 
> XOXO


	5. Savior

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all for the replies! the he pronoun will be used for Loki, but the her pronoun might also accidentally slip in sometimes :)

The days go on without Thor ever budging an inch in his mistrust.

The full moon passes, and Loki casts an enchantment so that he doesn’t turn back into his dual sex. It would be strange after all if he went back to looking like a boy, after meeting Thor as a girl.

The cut on the back of Thor’s head is less severe than it first looked but Loki still makes sure to bandage it every day. Thor’s ankle seems to be on the road to recovery, though that recovery is still a long one. The only injury that does not seem to make the best of progress is the one on Thor’s side, which has already reopened seven times now.

“You move too much,” Loki snarls one day while resetting it. “You move far too much for a man who is injured.”

Thor, sweating buckets, likely close to passing out from the pain, gives Loki a dazed response.

“When will you kill me, spy? I grow tired of this…Hel.”

Loki barely resists the urge to knock Thor on the upside of his head.

“I should kill you right now, is what I should do! Stubborn boy! If you had only listened to me your wound wouldn’t have reopened again!”

“Tyr?” Thor only says in response, his eyes foggy. “Tyr, are you there? Come out now. Come out from behind the walls.”

It is another useless day in which no trust is gained.

-

Thor watches the girl a lot, when she isn’t watching back.

She seems a strange choice of spy for Tyr – but that of course might be the point. To throw Thor off. And if she were not a spy, how could one explain Tyr’s appearance in the woods?

Ase says it is because it’s enchanted, but Thor has never seen such enchantments before.

It would explain a lot of things ( _his eight year old self, the way Tyr seemed to appear out of thin air_ ) but-

Her being a spy would explain a lot of things as well.

Everything about the girl is suspicious. Is Thor supposed to believe she lives here on her own? Where are her parents? Her siblings? The girl looks to be 14 at most. Is Thor supposed to believe she lives in this hut, in the middle of nowhere, with nobody else around?

Tyr sending her here for him makes more sense. So you can't blame Thor for being so suspicious.

But besides that, there is nothing else that is very strange about the girl. She seems to be very poor, judging by the way she always walks around barefoot, and her clothes look like hand me downs, always sliding off her shoulders and barely going past her thighs.

But this poorness only serves as another strike against her in Thor’s mind – it gives her a motive to work for Tyr:

Monetary gain.

But each day the sun rises and sets, Thor loses more and more faith in the idea.

_Why keep him alive for so long? Why continuously keep cleaning his injuries and redressing his wounds? What is the point in waiting?_

After Thor threatens her, Thor notices a change in the girl. Ase is more wary around him. She does not try to engage him. She goes about her life in her own way, leaving him to his own devices.

It is a different kind of hell, the waiting. The doing nothing. Thor has not done ‘nothing’ a single minute of his life. Time has always been precious to Thor, especially since he’s never known how much of it he really has. And what a misnomer too. To say that one has time, when time really has you.

How many things could he be accomplishing if he were in Asgard right now? He could have persuaded the law council to introduce his bill to session. He could be talking to the nobles that supported Kustaa, and saving the best of them to join his side. He could be persuading Odin to send him back to Svartalfheim. He could be taking down another battalion.

But no, instead Thor is stuck in Grimstad with a child, confined to a bed, and the _nothingness_ grates at him.

As such, Thor doesn’t have much to do, so he tries to sleep most of the day, but well-restedness is never something he’s been used too, so mostly he watches Ase for entertainment.

Most days she’s out, God knows where, but sometimes she sweeps the inside of her hut, and washes the dishes, and of course makes them food.

Other times Thor can see her through the window, hanging clothes on the line, the wind blowing through her hair.

Sometimes, during these times, Ase will laugh, as if the wind is a funny thing.

It is the only time Thor hears her laugh.

The more the days pass, and the less Thor sleeps, the more he watches Ase. Usually, she will cook at sunset, and the light from the window makes her glow. Thor watches her the most during these times.

Thor realizes, the more time passes, that he wants to trust her. He wants to believe she isn’t a spy of Tyr’s, because, why would he? If she were really a spy on Tyr, it would mean he was only counting the days to his eventual death, and what kind of maniac would wish for that?

Thor wants to trust her, but he needs a sign.

A sign that shows him once and for all what she truly is.

-

The one thing Loki likes about his female form is that he’s able to wear dresses. Dresses are so quick and easy to wear and have none of the complications of buttons and zippers and such.

Loki chooses a robin blue one for the day, with a white bow around the waist, and grabs a basket, ready to set out.

“I’m going to pick blackberries today, Thor, would you like some?” Loki asks politely.

_I need to get him on my side one way or another._

But Thor doesn’t even look at her, simply staring at the wall in front of him. He grunts.

_Be polite be polite be polite be-_

“Fine!” Loki snaps. “You don’t want some? That’s your problem. You’ll be missing out.”

Loki leaves the house with a dramatic swish of his dress.

_No progress, absolutely no progress has been made._

_How am I ever going to make him want to bed me?_

-

Loki comes back right when the sun is about to set, tired and flushed from spending all day looking for blackberries.

 _But at least the basket is full_ , Loki thinks happily. _Now I can smush them into blackberry jam, and sell them at the Upsala market for a good price…_

Loki’s thoughts trail off when he sees the door to the outhouse swinging back and forth in the wind.

_Did Thor use the outhouse while I was gone? But that’s impossible. He always needs my help to get there._

Was the latch simply weak?

Loki walks forward cautiously, basket still in his hand, and right when he’s only a couple paces a way a man bursts out from the outhouse and tackles him.

The first thing Loki is aware of is the burning feeling around his neck. The man has both his hands locked around Loki’s throat, his golden rings glinting menacingly in the light.

Loki screams. It feels like his throat’s on fire.

“You god awful _witch_ ,” the man spits at her. “Do you remember me? Do you remember my friends? Do you remember what you did to them? Where’s the rest of your little whore sisters, huh?” The man shakes her back and forth like a rag doll. “ _Huh?!”_

The man looks like the typical victim of Herkja and the sisters. He is portly, looks to be about middle aged, and he has beady, ugly eyes. Its possible he could’ve been with the group before the loggers.

Loki opens his mouth to say something, anything, but the lack of air to his brain and the unbearable burn around his neck won’t let him.

The man laughs at the expression on his face.

“I bet you’re wondering what that is, huh? That burn you feel around your neck, that’s stopping you from casting any of your little spells?” The man leans close to her, whispers into her ear.

“That’s dwarfish gold, baby girl. I came prepared.”

It’s like a boulder dropping at the bottom of his stomach. Herkja has warned them all about dwarfish gold and the way it mutes out seidr.

“It’s strange,” the man says, staring at her. “I don’t remember seeing you there. Maybe you were too young then. But I can tell, just looking at you, that you’re one of them.” A mean glint crawls its way into the man’s murky brown eyes. “Maybe I should leave your sisters a gift. Maybe I should do the same thing to you that they did to my men. Maybe I should fuck you dry and kill you, leave you as food for the ravens to eat.”

And this, most of all, sends Loki plunging into a deep well of fear.

Its not a full moon. Loki will get no power from it. The man will kill her. And most of all

 _I don’t want to lay with him. I don’t even want to_ touch _him. Not him not him not him **not him**_

“You know what? I think that’s just what I’ll do.”

Loki bucks in his grasp. He tries to scream but it comes out soundless.

_Lilith, please. I’ll do anything. Anything._

The man unbuckles his belt with one hand. He licks his lips salaciously.

“Oh, God,” the man groans. “Just look at you. You’re a tight little piece, aren’t you?”

Loki feels tears streaming down his face.

_No. Please. Not him. Not him._

The man slides his hand up Loki’s thigh, dangerously close to Loki’s underwear, and Loki kicks him, hard.

It knocks him off of him for a second, and suddenly, Loki can breathe again.

Loki feels his seidr surge in him but before it can be cast, the man backhands him across the face with his rings.

Loki feels the imprint sizzle onto his cheek.

“You dirty cunt!” The man screams, and wraps his hands around Loki’s throat tighter this time. “I’ll kill you for that! Ill kill you!”

White spots start to float up in Loki’s visions. He feels himself quickly losing consciousness.

 _At least he didn’t touch me_ , he thinks viciously _. At least now Herjka can't boss me around, and take my eyes out whenever she likes. At least I’ll die myself…_

And then the pressure is taken from his throat again, and when Loki opens his eyes, there is Thor holding a broom against the fat man’s throat, _Loki’s_ broom, holding _tight tight tight_ and then even _tighter_ , forcing the man’s back to his front casually as if it were an embrace, until finally there is a sharp

_Crack._

The fat man’s body drops lifelessly to the ground. Thor looks at Loki, face expertly blank.

“Are you okay?”

Loki stares at Thor in shock.

_I could’ve…I almost…He…_

And processing it all, of what just happened, Loki lets out a great big wet sob.

His body shakes as he cries, his dress rucked up his thighs, his wild curls even more tangled than usual, covered in grass, his neck still burning.

It seems to break Thor out his perfect mask because he looks alarmed as he watches Loki cry as if he were gasping for air.

Thor drops the broom handle. He reaches out a hand, tentatively. He watches Loki cautiously.

“Hey, calm-“

It’s all the invitation Loki needs.

He throws herself into Thor’s arms, clinging to him as if he were a life raft.

He buries his head into Thor’s chest.

“I was so _scared_ , Thor. Even more than when you scared me. He wanted to…he wanted to…” And Loki can't even say the words, lets out a great big shaking sob instead.

Thor is stiffer than a tree, his arms hovering awkwardly around Loki, until shudders begin to run through Loki’s body, his breath coming out in quicker and quicker successions.

Thor jumps into action.

He pulls Loki tight to him, runs a comforting hand up and down his back.

“Hey,” he says into Loki’s ear, voice unwavering. “Breathe, Ase. Breathe. Just slow down and breathe. Match my breaths. Just like this.”

Thor takes a deep breath, and Loki can feel his chest expand and deflate right below his own. Loki tries to mimic him.

Loki’s breathes start to slow. He feels his heart beat more steadily in his chest.

Thor runs his fingers through Loki’s hair encouragingly, picking out the grass and the sticks.

“Good girl.” He says reassuringly. “That’s a good girl.”

Loki feels something shiver in him at Thor’s words, and he clings tighter. When his breaths finally steady, however, he pushes away from Thor, and looks up at him through his lashes.

Thor stares at him with that unwavering blue gaze. He brushes the tears away from Loki’s face with his thumb, then leaves his hand there.

“Are you okay, now?”

Loki nods shyly.

Thor watches him for a long while, before moving his hand from Loki’s face and brushing back his curls.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly.

Loki blinks, for a second struck dumb.

“For what?” Loki asks in a scratchy voice.

Thor’s eyes flicker down to his throat. He traces the cut there, gently, mindful of the new injuries.

“For hurting you. For thinking you were a spy.”

Loki rolls his eyes. He wraps his arms around Thor’s neck and clings to him again.

“I don’t want to talk about that silly spy stuff ever again. Don’t even mention it.”

From over his shoulder, Loki catches sight of the broom, abandoned.

“Where’d you get that from?” He asks innocently.

If Loki hadn’t spent so much time in silence with Thor already, he would've never recognized the millisecond of a pause there was before Thor answered-

“It was by my bed.”

And Loki pretends to believe him, because after all

_It’s better if he thinks I’m stupid, isn’t it?_


	6. The Little Witch & Her Tricks

Ase is gone for a long time.

Thor is used to her going out for long stretches but she hasn’t done so in a while, so Thor finds himself especially agitated for something to do.

There is a fly buzzing somewhere and Thor grinds his teeth in frustration at not being able to do anything about it.

_This is her punishment. She was upset that I didn’t want her stupid blackberries. And now she’s left me here with nothing to do except stare at this blank wall._

Luckily for Thor, Ase has left her broom by him again. If he sits up and leans forward just a bit he can reach it, even if it does break his stiches again.

 _Perfect_ , he thinks when he’s grabbed it _. Now I can practice walking_.

Thor unscrews the broom and after a couple of tries is able to stand up completely. He walks around the hut a little, carefully watching for Ase’s signature black hair anywhere in the horizon, and then lays back down in the bed once he’s tired himself.

He winces as he lays back down, and glares at the broom handle.

He feels like an old man with a cane.

_But, if I get good enough at this, at walking again, without Ase knowing, I can leave this place._

Another part of Thor thinks

_Why wait? You could kill her when she comes back right now and be done with it._

But Thor shakes the thought out of his head. He won’t kill her now. Not yet. Not when he’s still seriously injured and she’s healing him so perfectly.

But soon.

Soon.

-

Sometime in between staring at the wall and staring out the hut, Thor falls asleep.

He’s woken from his sleep by a piercing scream.

When he looks out the window of the hut he sees Ase in perfect view, struggling and screaming against a man on top of her.

The man is snarling at her and Ase bucks at him with all her strength, but just looking at the scene you know she doesn’t have a chance in Hel at unseating him.

 _Come on little spy_ , Thor thinks _, show me. It’s now or never. You show your true self, or you’ll die. If its like I think, and Tyr really sent you, no way this man is going to be able to take you._

_No way._

And if not by strength alone, which Thor has never thought to be the case, then by some trick up her sleeve, a dart of poison she was saving just for him, or a knife under her dress.

But seconds pass by, and each second the man only tightens his grip on Ase’s throat, Ase struggling uselessly below him.

And Thor realizes, staring at the girl, and her thin frame, and her baby face, that that’s what she truly is:

Just a girl.

Just a girl, who came upon him in the woods, and saved his life.

“Shit,” Thor curses. “Fuck.”

Thor is almost never wrong, but when he is, it’s a hit to his pride.

He has to do something now while the man is distracted, or else Thor will wind up dead next, just by result of his condition.

Thor catches sight of the broom handle.

He begins to untwist.

-

It’s only after he’s killed the man that Thor realizes just how terribly wrong he was.

Ase is a mess on the grass, her dress rucked up far past her thighs, showcasing legs like pale ribbon, one shoe on, the other a couple leagues away, twigs and leaves in her wild hair.

She cries like a baby. Wails really, her usually porcelain face marred pink from distress, her green eyes filled with tears, her lashes dark and wet. She wails up at the sky sitting on her knees, her arms like useless things besides her. And her sobs are so great that her tiny body seems to shake with them, so violently it scares Thor.

Thor, alarmed, reaches out a hand.

“Hey calm-“

The girl dives for him, throws her thin wrists around his neck and clings to him like a baby monkey, and Thor could swear he could count her bones she was pressed against him so tight, everything about her so delicate.

 _She’s a child_ , Thor thinks, aghast. _She’s a child. How could I ever have thought otherwise, how could I ever have thought her capable enough to be a spy, when all her emotions show plainly on her face like water? How stupid I was._

“I was so scared, Thor. Even more than when you scared me. He wanted to…he wanted to…”

And Thor knows, exactly, what that fat man wanted to do. Saw him slide his hands up her dress when Thor was sneaking up on them. But he doesn’t know what to say and isn’t much moved by her distress. Thor is so desensitized to rape, having seen it so many times during his childhood on the battlefield, that he cannot find the words to comfort her.

Thor has not saved this girl out of the goodness of his heart. He has saved her, one, out of his own self interest, and two, because she saved him first and he owes it to her.

But when Ase begins to breathe quicker, her breaths shallow and fast, Thor recognizes the start of a panic attack.

_(baldr used to have them all the time, after odin drowned hodr)_

This is something he knows how to fix, so he presses Ase tightly to him, tells her to mimic his breath. He tries his best to soothe her as the nursemaids used to soothe Baldr, rubbing circles on her back and gently running his fingers through her hair, picking out the twigs and the leaves.

And, because this girl is so very much like an animal, he tries the words he always uses on Nike.

“Good girl,” he says gently. “Very good girl.”

Thor can feel it when the girl’s breaths go back to normal, and that’s when she leans back to look at him with wet eyes.

There is something in her expression almost like awe, as if she is seeing him for the first time, her face naked and vulnerable and plain to see.

He brushes the tears from her face and wonders marvelously at his stupidity.

_She’s like an open book._

_How could’ve I ever have thought she was one of Tyr’s snakes? I can read her so easy. She doesn’t hide anything. And if she does, its obvious._

This was the sign he was looking for. This. It’s a good turn of events for him. Though he’s not completely sure of her motives for saving him, he can cast out Tyr.

 _She looks malleable yet_ , Thor thinks, staring at her defenseless face. _If I play nice, there might be a happy ending._

And, the first step in playing nice is apologizing.

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, eyes cast down, his hand tracing the cut he made gently.

He feels, somewhat, disgusted at himself.

 _I hurt a little girl,_ he thinks. _How spineless and cowardly. Like something Gulli would’ve done._

The girl blinks up at him, stupidly.

“For what?”

“For hurting you. For thinking you were a spy.”

But Ase only rolls her eyes at him, as if he’s ridiculous, before embracing him again.

“I don’t want to talk about that silly spy stuff ever again. Don’t even mention it.”

And then, so innocently that Thor needs a second to process the words-

“Where’d you get that broom from?”

_By the oil lamp. I was going to kill you with it._

“It was by the bed,” Thor lies instead, and Ase says

“Oh,” so casually, taking Thor’s words for granted, that Thor smiles a bit.

_Like taking candy from a baby._

-

Ase helps Thor inside, his arm over her shoulder, supporting his weight, before setting him on the bed.

Sure enough, Thor’s wound has opened up again and Ase clucks.

“Silly goose,” Ase admonishes, more teasing than anything. “You opened it again!”

_Silly goose. She called me a silly goose. How on earth was I supposed to believe this girl was a spy again?_

Ase is still dressed in her blue dress with green smears from the grass, dirt on her cheeks.

She presses gentle fingers against Thor’s wound, and Thor nearly kills her right then for the pain even _that_ causes him.

“I’m sorry,” Ase says when she sees him wince. “I’m going to have to stitch it up again.”

Thor barely keeps himself from groaning.

“There’s not another way?”

Thor feels a fever coming on, beads of sweat forming above his brow. Another bad sign.

Ase notices this and places her hand on Thor’s forehead.

“Thor!” She exclaims anxiously, biting at her lip. “Don’t tell me you’re getting a fever again?”

 _Yes, you useless idiot_ , he wants to snap back. _What else do you think it is?_ But he remembers he’s playing nice, so he refrains.

Thor watches instead as Ase pulls back her wild curls into a ponytail behind her, something elegant and beautiful about the simple gesture.

She brushes the strands of hair that stick to his face gently, and it’s such an odd thing, someone treating him that gently.

“I’m going to have to stitch it up again,” Loki murmurs, and this time Thor doesn’t bother hiding his groan.

“But don’t worry.” She says, eyes flickering nervously to meet his. “I have something so that it won’t hurt.”

-

Ase puts a salve over his wound.

“What is that?” He grunts out, and Ase’s eyes snap up to meet his.

“It’s uh, uhm-“ she stutters ineloquently. “Uh- goat fat. It can act as a anesthetic.”

Thor stares at her critically. “Goat fat? I don’t think so. That’s not going to work.”

“It’s uh, mixed with herbs. It’s not _just_ goat fat. It’ll work.”

“Ase I don’t think-“

“Listen,” Ase snaps, flaring her nostrils, her eyes a burning green. “Who is the doctor and who is the patient?”

 _Sigh_. “You are.”

“I am the what?”

“The doctor.” _If barely._

But Ase looks satisfied at this and rubs more of the salve on Thor’s wound.

When she winds the first thread through his injury, Thor feels it. He takes a sharp intake of breath.

“Ase, I can-“

But just as quickly as the pain came, it’s gone. The next thread Ase pulls through his skin, Thor doesn’t feel it at all. But he knows she’s still doing it because he’s watching her do it. If not for that, he wouldn’t believe she was pulling a needle through his skin at all.

Thor feels himself relax, his jaw unclench. He stares at her in surprise.

“I don’t feel anything at all,” he tells her, obvious wonder in his voice, and Ase glances up at him for a quick second with a half smile on her face before turning her attention back to his wound.

Ase works diligently, every point on her face and body focused on his injury. It’s a sight he’s rarely allowed, considering most of the time he’s shutting his eyes in pain at her ministrations. But this time, he can properly take a look.

Ase treats him like fine china. Nimble fingers thread his stitch in and out, graceful and quick like a spider. Her tongue is peeking out the corner of her mouth, though Thor is sure she does this unconsciously, and her dress is falling off one shoulder, showing off a delicate collarbone. The setting sun is illuminated behind her, so much so she almost seems to glow.

 _She’s a child, really_ , Thor thinks, looking at her. But he doesn’t think this is in his usual critical way. He thinks it rather fondly, because such a serious face looks funny on her.

He chuckles at bit at her expression, his chest rumbling, and Ase looks up anxiously.

“Did I hurt you?” She asks, her lashes fluttering nervously.

A lock of hair falls into her face and Thor pushes it behind her ear gently, a half-smile on his face.

Ase blinks at this, surprised at the gesture, before an almost imperceptible blush rises on her face.

 _A child really,_ Thor thinks again, amused, _in all the ways that count._

-

The second step in playing nice is asking for forgiveness. Thor wants to seem properly regretful, and he tries to communicate this with his attitude.

“I really am sorry,” he tells Ase after she’s done stitching him up. “I know you said not to worry about it, but I still feel bad. You saved me after all.” _For reasons you still haven’t properly explained, but whatever_. “Since I didn’t believe you, you can ask me anything you want in return.”

For half a second there’s seems to be an almost imperceptible narrowing of Ase’s eyes. But it’s gone so fast Thor is sure he’s imagined it. If she’s suspicious she won’t be able to hide it well.

-

“Well, I was wondering why you suspected me.” Loki tells Thor, seeing an opportunity.

_This man-boy will tell me why he suspected me, and thus I will rid him of his suspicions by proposing logical answers. It’s perfect. And once trust is built, seduction can be established._

“I just thought it was all rather strange is all.” Thor tells him, gaze unwavering. Testing him. “A child living out here alone. There is not a single other hut in sight, and you don’t seem to work a day in your life, and yet you have a good supply of food and clothing and other such things. And then coincidentally, in the middle of all this nothing, you managed to save me? It seemed more likely you had been placed here as a spy.”

“First of all,” Loki tells him, slightly incensed, “I am not a child. I am sixteen.”

The stark surprise on Thor’s face only incenses him more. “Really?”

“How old did you think I was?” Loki snaps.

“Thirteen at most,” Thor says frankly. “It’s just you’re very…”

“What?” Loki snaps. “I’m very what?”

“…small. Delicate looking. At sixteen, the girls in the capital are much more…endowed.”

Loki’s face burns so hot it feels like it’s on fire.

_He’s talking about my breasts! My breasts! And the fact that I don’t have a single curve on my body!_

“You’re disgusting,” Loki sneers, trying to cover up his complete embarrassment at the fact.

But Thor only shrugs, not embarrassed at all by what he’s just said.

Loki tries to bleed the color out of his face, takes long and calming breaths before continuing.

“I don’t live here alone.” Loki pauses, then starts again. “Well, I do, mostly, but I was raised by my sisters. My parents died when I was young.”

_It’s good to stick to white lies. Easier._

If Thor feels pity for him at this, he hides it well. Loki is grateful for that at least. To be honest, Thor doesn’t look moved at all.

“My sisters live in Upsala,” Loki lies. “They don’t like to visit me very much, but they bring me things from time to time so I don’t starve.”

Thor stares at him curiously. “Why don’t you live with them?”

“They don’t like me.” Truth. “They think I’m the reason my _\- our_ \- mother died. So they’ve left me here in the house we grew up in, like abandoning something dirty in a closet so you don't ever have to see it again.” Loki tells him bitterly.

Loki looks up at him. Thor seems to believe him.

“What about you?” Loki asks.

Thor blinks. “What?”

“Your brothers don’t like you either if I had to guess,” Loki says obviously. “Why’s that?”

Thor looks at him carefully. “You really don’t recognize my name? Or my brother’s?”

Loki rolls his eyes. “Thor, I never much leave this place except to go to Upsala, let alone the capital. Why would I know your name?”

“Well,” Thor says slowly, “I’m the son of a baron.”

Loki’s eyes nearly bug out his head.

“The son of a baron? _Really_?” And then Loki’s eyes narrow, smelling a fib. “You’re not just having a good laugh at me, are you?”

Thor’s mouth twitches, and for a second Loki’s _really_ convinced it’s a fib, before Thor turns serious again.

“No. No _fib_. I’m the son of a baron. The youngest. I have eleven brothers, and we all hate each other. You see, we all want our father’s title, and father has promised it to the strongest son.”

“Is that why you think – was it Tyr?” Thor nods, and Loki continues. “Is that why you thought Tyr was trying to kill you?”

It makes more sense now. Thor is the son of a baron. Baron’s aren’t high in station as ranks go, but it’s still a rank. Loki has never met a noble in real life so the fact that he’s looking at one right now is amazing.

“He’s the oldest brother.” And a dark cloud seems to fall over Thor’s features, true hatred. “He’s tried every way to foil me. He tried to kill me when I was a child, but he failed. And now, father wants us to show our true strength in battle, and he’s even taken that from me.”

Loki stares, enraptured at the story Thor has spun.

“How so?”

Thor blinks, looking up as if just realizing Loki is still there as well. He seem to watch her for a long time, considering something, before he finally speaks.

“My father sent me to Jotunheim when I was twelve. To fight the Jotnars. But Tyr faired better there, so I left for Svartalfheim. Now, seeing the progress I’ve made, Tyr wants to take Svartalfheim from me.”

Loki stares at Thor in horror. “He sent you at twelve years old to fight in Jotunheim?”

_Jotunheim, the same place my father’s from?_

Thor seems surprised at Loki’s shock. “That’s custom in Asgard. Not even custom, it’s law. At twelve years old every abled body male is forced into the All-father’s army. It’s mandatory.”

“That’s awful!” Loki cries. “You were just a child.”

Thor stares at him. “It’s not awful. It how it should be. How else would the All-father have control of all nine realms?”

“He shouldn’t have control of all nine realms.” Loki says, aghast. “He has no business being in any other realm but his own. If they call him Odin the Matchless, it is not for his battle prowess, but for his greed.”

“How else would Asgard be so great?”

“Great?” Loki snaps. “You think it’s great? You think my life here is great? You think sending children to fight in a war in a country that isn’t theirs by a king who doesn’t give a flying fib about them is great?”

Thor dismisses him with a look. “You’re a child. You wouldn’t understand.”

“I’m the child who saved your great, Asgardian _arse_ you useless idiot! If it weren’t for me, you’d be dead. So don’t tell me I don’t understand.”

Loki is breathing hard by the end of his rant, face flushed and upset.

Thor’s face, as impenetrable as iron, seems to soften at his obvious distress.

“Listen, I didn’t mean to upset you okay?”

Loki stays dead silent.

“Okay?” Thor says again, and this time, he places his hand over his, and Loki flushes for an entirely different reason.

_How can we be only three years apart in age, and yet he dwarfs me in every way possible?_

“Okay,” Loki mutters, giving in, and Thor smiles at him. He tucks back an unruly curl.

“Good girl,” he says, and Loki feels that shudder of _something_ zip up his spine pleasurably.

 _Ugh. What is wrong with you?_ Loki thinks. _Stop seeking validation from this village idiot. Just because he’s handsome, and has eyes like the blue of the sky, and hair like sunshine, and big, strong, manly hands…_

Loki shakes his head rid of his thoughts.

_Dangerous. Very dangerous. You’re supposed to seduce this boy not be seduced!_

“Hey,” Thor says, tugging at one of his curls teasingly, and Loki almost purrs.

_Get a grip! Get a fucking grip!_

“I was thinking,” he says, blue eyes meeting her green ones, and Loki melts. “I was thinking, you know, I still feel bad. So you can ask me anything you want right now, within reason, and I’ll give it to you.”

“Huh?” Loki asks dopily, still lost in his eyes, and Thor laughs.

It’s the first time Loki has ever heard him laugh. He thinks it lights up his face in a way that’s entirely illegal, and that he should do it more often.

“Are you okay in there?” he asks, still laughing, cupping Loki’s face between his hands, and Loki almost swoons.

 _Touch me more. Pet me more. Call me a good girl, please. I’ll do anything to be your good girl_.

Thor combs back Loki’s hair with his fingers, still smiling, and Loki feels his eyes droop.

“I _said_ if you want something from me, all you got to do is ask and I’ll give it to you.”

Loki eyes snap open. “Anything?”

Thor pulls on a curl. “Within _reason_.”

Loki thinks hard. His first thought is, _please touch me more_ , but of course that’s a stupid and entirely brainless thing to ask for, not to mention embarrassing.

_Remember, Loki. Remember what this boy is here for._

And all of a sudden Loki knows what he wants.

“I want to sleep on the bed.”

If Thor was expecting something, it was not this. He looks slightly disappointed.

“Really?” At Loki’s curious stare, Thor seems to backtrack. “I mean, yeah, I guess that’s only fair. It’s your bed. I’ve recovered well enough know that I can sleep on the floor now, probably, with not much of a problem.”

“What?” Loki’s eyes nearly bug out of his head. “I’m not going to make you sleep on the floor. You’re injured. Do you think I’m a monster or something?”

Thor’s eyebrows crinkle adorably. “But I thought you said-”

“We’ll sleep together, silly.” Loki says, poking his nose.

Thor stares at him, eyes bugging out. “Did you just poke my nose?”

Loki laughs at the completely bewildered expression on his face.

“Obviously. Why? Has no one ever poked your nose before?”

“No.” Thor says, looking at him strangely. “Listen, Ase, there’s not enough space on the bed for the two of us. I’ll sleep on the floor and you can sleep on the bed, it’s fine. I’ve slept in worse places.”

“What worse places?”

“Well, for one, my brother refused to give me a cot in Jotunheim so instead I slept outside in the wine cellar. It got so cold once I almost lost both my feet and hands.”

It’s almost as bad as what Herkja’s done to Loki. Loki feels his face twist in righteous anger at the fact.

“That’s horrible! Your brother should be punished for such a thing. If he were here right now, I’d punish him for you!”

Thor smartly hides his smile, his lips twitching almost imperceptibly.

“Oh yeah? And how would you punish him?”

_I’d take both is eyes out with a hot poker. I’d pull his teeth out one by one. I’d put a centipede in his ear and let it eat it’s way to the other side._

But Loki can’t say all of this, obviously.

“I’d, well I’d report him to the authorities!” Loki huffs indignantly.

And this time Thor really does laugh, for reasons unknown to Loki.

“Thank you, Ase.” He says. “That’s very kind of you.”

“So are you going to let me sleep with you?”

Thor narrows his eyes suspiciously at Loki’s choice of wording, but Loki only blinks innocently up at him.

“Loki, I already told you. There’s not enough room. I can sleep on the floor.”

Loki pouts. “But you said I could ask for anything. _Anything_.”

He gives Thor puppy eyes, and sees Thor’s resolve slowly crumble till it’s all rubble at Loki’s feet.

“Nine Hells, Ase. Fine. We can both sleep on the cot. I did promise you after all.”

Loki bites down a squeal of delight.

“Well,” he says, as casual as can be, “I’m gonna get ready for bed. Be back in a bit.”

-

The first step in seducing someone is looking the part.

Loki readies a bath with lavender and hydrangea and combs his hair until it shines. He pinches his cheeks to add color to them and bites down on his lips.

For the first time ever, Loki wishes he had cosmetics like Herkja and the others had. And, looking at his reflection in the mirror, the same endowments.

Loki pushes his tits together in the mirror and frowns when the image is not anything close to Herkja’s breasts. He’ll just have to make do with what he’s got.

Loki picks one of his nicer night shifts with thin straps and lace trimming. Like most of Loki’s night shifts it ends high above Loki’s knees, brushing his thighs.

Loki looks at himself in the mirror, wondering if it will be enough.

“I’m beautiful. He’s beautiful. Together, we’ll make a beautiful coupling. That should be enough, right?”

It’ll have to be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow. so many words and they haven't even fucked yet.
> 
> why am i like this LMAO


	7. Like Lovers Do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is so fucking soft lmao

When Loki steps back into the hut she looks like she’s made out of moonlight. Her ivory shift matched with her ivory skin make everything else about her pop. She glows eerily in the dark.

“Do you want me to take you to the bathroom now?”

Thor stares at her. The straps on her night shift are so thin Thor’s surprised that the wind doesn’t snap them right off.

“Yes I’m- yes. That’d be good.”

For a such a small girl, she is only small in width. Ase is taller than most girls he knows, but not yet close to being as tall as him. Thor wraps an arm across her shoulders and she helps him walk to the outhouse.

He smells…flowers.

“Are you wearing perfume?” He asks, slightly bewildered.

Ase laughs. “No silly. I just took a bath with hydrangeas and lavender. I can’t afford something like perfume.”

“Oh.”

When they get to the outhouse Ase sets him on the toilet and tells him to rest his head in a bucket while she washes his hair.

Ase hums as she does, rubbing into his scalp and Thor’s eyes dropping sleepily at the ministrations. It’s only until he feels a lock of Ase’s hair fall into his face that he blinks them open.

That’s when he notices the necklace with a single pearl on it.

“I’ve never seen you wear that before.” He asks suspiciously. It dangles in his face. “Where’d you get it?”

It’s strange. Ase looks different tonight. She’s put effort in her appearance where she hasn’t before. Her hair is suspiciously shiny and she smells like flowers.

Thor hopes she’s not getting any strange ideas in her head.

“It was my mother’s.” Ase says simply.

 _And why are you wearing it tonight, out of all nights?_ Is what he really wants to ask, but instead he settles for staring up at her.

There goes that strap, falling over her shoulder like always. Her cheeks are a rosy pink and her curls are tightly coiled, like ivy wrapping around a fence, as black and as glittering as the night sky. And her lips, small rosebuds, her eyes, precious peridot stones.

 _She’ll be very lovely when she grows up,_ Thor thinks suddenly. He tells her this.

Loki’s eyes snap down to meet his and she pinkens even more. She throws a soapy hand over his eyes.

“You’re not supposed to look at me.” She says quickly.

“What? Ase, don’t be ridiculous.” He tries to move her hand but finds a surprising strength there.

“It breaks my concentration.”

“Ase-“

“I’m serious, Thor. You can’t. It’s not fair.”

_What is going on in her tiny little head?_

“Fine.” Thor sighs. “I’ll keep my eyes closed, okay?”

And so Thor keeps his eyes closed as Ase washes the rest of his hair.

-

“Why are you combing my hair? There’s nothing to comb.”

Thor and Ase sit together on Ase’s cot, Ase leaning over him to brush at his supposed ‘knots.’

“Thor,” Ase says pompously, “personal hygiene is _important._ ”

“I just don’t see why you have to do it. I broke my ankle not my arm.”

Ase sits back on her knees for a second and looks him in the eyes very serious.

“But you don’t comb your hair, do you? So you wouldn’t do it right.”

“Ase,” he says exasperatedly, “it’s just _hair_.”

Ase gives him a look as if this proves her point exactly and leans forward again to brush his hair.

It’s unsettling, the way Ase treats him. The spoon feeding and the hair washing and the hair brushing.

“Do you think I’m your pet or something?”

“Don’t be a silly goose, Thor.” Ase says vaguely, combing his hair, unaware of how close their faces are to each other. So close, in fact, that Thor can count all her freckles.

_Cute._

“Oh? Then are you getting close to me just so you can kiss me?”

Ase snaps at attention at that. Thor means it as a joke really, but you wouldn’t have noticed by the way Ase reacts.

Her face burns a bright red and she leans back so quickly she almost topples over the bed.

“Wha-I – I don’t know what you mean. Kissing? What is kissing? I don’t know.” Ase splutters out like a maniac.

Thor can't help it. He laughs at the completely helpless expression on her face.

_She’s such a child._

“Ase, it was joke you maniac. You don’t have to have a fit over it.”

“I knew that.” She says stubbornly, a cross expression falling over her face.

It’s only when Ase turns off the oil lamps and they both tuck into bed that Thor realizes how truly uncomfortable it’s going to be.

Ase presses as tight as she can to him on the bed, so close he can even feel the slight curves of her thin body (miracle that is), and even then there’s barely enough space on the bed.

Thor, moving his arm to try and pull up the cover, accidentally grips Ase’s hips by accident and she lets out a high pitched squeal.

_Nine hells, how thin is that shift? I could feel the warmth of her skin._

“Sorry about that,” he says uncomfortably, and Ase lets out a nervous laugh.

“It’s okay.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to sleep on the floor?”

“Thor,” Ase says with a loud sigh, “you said anything.”

“Right,” he replies back carefully. “Just checking.”

After a long stretch of silence, Ase speaks into the dark.

“Are you uncomfortable?” She murmurs. “Maybe if you wrapped an arm around my waist you could have more space…”

And that’s the last straw for Thor.

He sits up and stares at her in the dark. She looks like a shadow in the light of the moon.

“Alright. What’s going on here?”

Ase blinks innocently at him. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You tell me you want to sleep with me. You wear your nicest clothes and a necklace, and you take a bath in flowers. Now, you’re telling me to wrap an arm around your waist.” Thor stares at her, hard gaze unwavering. “See what I mean now.”

Ase looks away from him. “I don’t…”

“Ase I’m not fucking you.”

Ase gapes at him in shock, her face coloring. “You – what? I didn’t even – who said I wanted to make love to you-“

_Love? Did she just say **love**? Oh god. This has gone far enough._

“Just stop it. Stop. You’re embarrassing yourself, so stop pretending. I hate games and stupid is not a good look on you.”

And finally Ase snaps.

“Why?” She bites out, eyes fierce. “Why should I stop? Why should I not want to lay with you? Is it because I’m not one of your Capital girls? Because I don’t have any fucking tits? Am I a fucking mountain troll or something? Not good enough for you to lay with?” Tears start to form in Loki’s clover eyes. “Fuck you, Thor. Fuck you.”

 _Shit. Fuck._ Thor thinks _. This is exactly why I don’t deal with children. Look how easily they break._

_Playing nice, remember? Playing nice, you stupid fucking idiot._

“Hey. Hey,” Thor says gently, trying to grab Ase’s hand, but she wrenches it away.

“Ase, you’re _fourteen_.”

“I am SIXTEEN, you donkey dick!”

_Shit. Right._

“Ase, you’re – you see – you’re like a sister to me. A dear little sister-“

This is Ase’s breaking point.

“I hate you, Thor!” She sobs. “I HATE _you_!” She says, before running out the hut.

 _Shit_.

-

Thor reaches her by using the broom as a crutch.

“Ase, you’re going to make me break my leg,” he says when he finally reaches her.

“Good,” she spits back, bitter. “You deserve it.”

Thor sighs. “Ase, why are you making such a big deal about this? Why are you so upset?”

Ase turns to him in a fury, eyes like green Hel fire.

“Because you didn’t have to be so mean about it, Thor. You didn’t have to embarrass me. You didn’t have to-“ and her Ase chokes up, her eyes going shiny “you didn’t have to be so _cold_.”

_But I wasn’t. I wasn’t trying to embarrass you. I wasn’t trying to be mean. That’s just how I am. How I speak. It wasn’t personal._

“I didn’t mean it like that,” is all Thor says. “You _are_ very lovely,” He tries.

Loki scoffs and looks down at her feet.

“But not lovely enough for _you_ , right?”

Thor holds in a groan. Here he is trying to mend the ego of a teenage girl. There so many people Thor has upset in this world. So many upsetting things he’s done. And yet he’s never cared about any of it, until this girl. She’s upset, and Thor shouldn’t care like always, but he does.

“You know, I actually like you more than any other girl I’ve laid with. I like you more than all of the women I’ve ever met combined.”

And as the words come out of his mouth, Thor knows, strangely enough, that it’s true.

“Yeah,” Ase scoffs bitterly. She’s pulling grass by the fistful. “You like me more than any girl in the world, but not enough to lay with me.”

“Ase.” This time he can't help but groan. “Why does it matter if you lay with me? Why are you so fixated on this?”

“Because I don’t want to be a virgin forever, Thor!” Ase explodes, and then looks at him expectantly.

He blinks. “Oh,” he finally says after a moment of silence. “Was I supposed to be surprised?”

Ase punches him in the arm.

“I’m kidding, I’m _kidding_!” He tells her when the punches won’t stop. He locks his arm with hers to get her to stop punching him and interlocks their fingers.

“I’ll hold you tight tonight, okay? Like you wanted. We won’t lay together, but I’ll hold you in my arms. Like lovers do. Is that okay?”

Ase pouts. “For now,” she mutters, and Thor laughs incredulously at her daring.

“You’re such a greedy little girl!”

“I am not a girl!” Ase cries out outrageously. She sniffs. “I am a _woman_.”

Thor barely keeps from rolling his eyes.

“Right. A woman.”

-

When they get back to the bed, Thor wraps an arm around Ase’s waist and pulls her to him.

She is so fine-boned. He can feel her heart against his chest, fluttering as fast as a hummingbird. And she is softer than anything he’s ever touched.

“Is this alright?” He whispers in her ear. She smells like everything that’s good in the world.

“Yeah,” Ase says, her voice trembling with nerves.

_(thor can't help but smile. It’s adorable)_

“Yeah.”


	8. Gestures

It’s not a lot, not really. It’s just Thor pressing Loki tight against him, his bulk covering Loki completely, and even that little bit of cuddling he had to beg and whine for but

It’s a start.

Loki wakes up with his limbs tangled up with Thor’s, his night shift rucking up the back of his ass. He pulls it down, blushing, and then turns to face Thor’s sleeping face.

He touches his foot with Thor’s and pokes his cheek with one finger.

“You’re going to fall for me, village idiot.” He says, like a promise. “You’re going to fall so stupid in love with me you won’t know what’s up and what’s down.”

Loki shuts away the voice that tells him otherwise. That tells him that isn’t the point of all this.

_(the point of all this, is of course, simply to fuck thor and then kill him)_

Thor looks so much more handsome asleep than awake. Probably because he doesn’t have that mean look on his face that makes him seem as cold as Jotuhheim ice.

Loki threads his fingers through Thor’s golden hair and admires the silky texture.

_It’s because I brushed it of course. And shampooed it._

Thor’s eyes snap open and Loki nearly falls off the bed in surprise.

“Who’s going to fall in love with who?”

Loki blanches. “You weren’t supposed to hear that,” he says accusingly.

But Thor simply sighs, detangling his body from Loki’s.

“I hate to tell you this sister Ase, but you have a greater chance at making a selkie love you. And they don’t have hearts.”

“Well,” Loki says snottily. “Nobody said I was talking about you.”

“Right,” Thor says easily. “So why do you want to fuck me then?”

Loki nearly chokes on his own spit. “Thor,” he hisses, “you can't just _ask_ things like that.”

Thor looks at him in bemusement. “Why not? It’s true isn’t it?”

“Yes, but-“ and then remembering he’s talking to a village idiot, Loki decides to let it go. He sighs extra dramatic.

“Fine,” he says sulkily. He glares at Thor. “Yes, I do want to…lay with you.”

Thor laughs, and his teeth shine ivory white in the light.

“It’s so cute the way you say it.”

“But you have to understand,” Loki continues, ignoring Thor’s teasing, “I will likely never get an opportunity like this again, Thor. I live in a town that has long been abandoned. The most contact I get with the world is in Upsala. And the only people who visits me are my sisters. When am I ever going to get a chance to lose my virginity, besides now?”

Thor gives him a knowing look. “So that’s why you saved me.”

Loki splutters. “It’s not just that. You’re handsome too!”

Thor looks unimpressed. “So you saved me because I’m handsome and you wanted to fuck me?”

_And kill you._

Loki toys with a thread nervously. “Well, when you put it that way it sounds bad.”

Both of them are sitting up in bed. Thor leans forward towards Loki, places his arms on either side of him. His sapphire gaze locks onto Loki’s.

“Okay. What’s so handsome about me?”

“W-what?” Loki stutters, unnerved at his attention. “You can't expect me to answer that.”

“You can,” Thor says casually. “Or else I’ll feel bad.”

_Nine hells._

Loki plays with the hem of his dress, unable to look Thor in the eye.

“Well, I guess-“

Thor places his hand over Loki’s, stops him from playing with his dress.

“Hey.” Thor raises Loki’s chin gently with his other hand. “You look people in the eye when you’re talking to them. Okay?”

He doesn’t say it in a mean way. But it’s not a suggestion. It’s a command.

Thor, sensing Loki’s nervousness, interlocks his fingers with hers.

Loki looks up shyly, meeting his eyes.

“I was going to say, well, the first handsome thing about you is your eyes. They’re very blue. But not just blue, obviously. They’re like…” Loki pauses, searching for the word, “Sapphires. And they change too. Like with the weather and all. They can be a _million_ shades of blue.”

Thor looks like’s he trying very hard not to smile.

“Okay. What else?”

Loki finds it easier to continue, getting lost in listing the ways Thor is handsome.

“Your jawline. Nine hells, your jawline. The first time I saw it I thought it would be able to cut _stone_.” Loki schmoozes. “Your shoulders too. I don’t why, but I just like them. They’re very broad.” Loki’s eyes light up. “Oh! And your stomach.” Loki places a hand on Thor’s abdomen, and marvels at the hardness there. “It’s very strange. I’ve never seen a stomach like it. Mine’s like a jelly bean.”

“And of course,” Loki says suddenly, blinking out his daze, “your hair.” He raises a hand to thread through the strands, admiring. “I mean it’s like molten gold. It’s so…I don’t know. You’re like a prince in a _fairy_ tale.”

Thor’s mouth twitches and this time he’s not able to hide it. Loki flushes, remembering himself.

“Oh!” Loki’s mouth twists unhappily. “It was a joke wasn’t it? You were making fun of me. _Again_. Just because I _like_ you-”

Loki makes to move out of the bed in a storm of fury but Thor’s hand keeps him there.

“Wait, no. Stop, okay.” There’s still a smile on his face but it looks apologetic. “I wasn’t trying to tease. Really. I’m sorry.”

“You always tease.”

“Do you really like me?”

Loki struggles to get himself out of Thor’s grip.

“Never mind, never mind! You don’t have to answer.”

Thor lets go and Loki shoves him back, hard, his faces screwed up in a scowl.

“Now it’s your turn tell me why I’m pretty.”

Thor blinks. “I never said you were pretty though.”

Loki starts beating on him with his fists and Thor laughs.

“It was a joke, Ase, jeez. Come on, isn’t it obvious? You’re beautiful.”

Loki sniffs pompously. “That doesn’t get you off the hook. You still have to list the ways.”

“Hm.” Thor looks at him carefully. “Okay.”

“I guess I’d start with your hair. It’s like a bush.”

Loki smacks him. “Thor! I’m _serious_. No jokes!”

Thor ducks and gives her a half smile, before going pensive.

“Your hair is like a galaxy,” he finally tells her, no joke in his face or his tone. “As deep and as dark as the night sky.” He tucks a curl behind her ear. “I wonder, really, how many prayers have gotten caught in its coils.”

If Loki expected anything, it was not this. His breathe seems caught in his throat.

_And here I called his jawline as sharp as a rock. How utterly stupid._

“You look paper thin, you know?” He tells her. “And you have elegant hands. But when I look at your eyes, greener than a tiger’s, I know you’re not weak. I like your smile. You know you laugh when the wind blows through your hair? Does it tickle you? I think you’re the most beautiful then. And I like the way you touch me a lot.”

Loki’s face burns. She pulls her hand from his. “I do not _touch_ you.”

Thor rolls his eyes, pulling on one of her curls. “Not like that you maniac. I just mean when you take care of me. It’s a different kind of touching then I’m used to. I like the way you find any excuse to do it.”

Loki’s outraged. “I do NOT-“

Thor knocks his forehead into Loki’s. He looks at her calmly.

“Joke, Ase. Joke.”

“Right,” Loki says breathlessly, unnerved by his proximity. “Joke.”

“You’re so pale.” Thor continues, his forehead still against Loki’s. “It reminds me of Jotunheim. I didn’t it like it much, but when you were outside the compound, there were these large stretches of just untouched snow. It was lovely. Like piles of sugar. And it was endless.” Thor smiles. “Like you.”

Loki, unable to handle the weight of Thor’s stare, presses her face into the crook of his neck.

“You’re teasing me again.”

Thor plays with her hair. “No. You told me to be serious.”

They’re silent for a while, Loki’s chin tucked into Thor’s neck, before Loki speaks again.

“Do you remember Jotunheim well?”

Thor does not respond for a long while. “Well enough. Why?”

“My father was from Jotunheim. What’s it like?”

Loki pulls away from Thor and lays on his side. Thor does the same, and they lay facing each other.

Thor still has a finger wrapped around her curl.

“Jotunheim was…” Thor looks for a word to say. “I don’t think you would like it,” he finally says. “It’s too cold for a person like you.”

“For a person like me?”

“Yes,” Thor says distractedly, still playing with Loki’s hair. “That’s the first thing you notice about Jotunheim. The cold. You’re too warm for a place like that. You laugh too much. You wouldn’t like it.”

Loki feels pleased for some reason. “What else?”

Loki grabs the hand that is playing with her hair and threads her fingers through them. Thor blinks up at her.

_I want your attention. Pay attention to me._

“The giants aren’t as big as you think.”

“Obviously,” Loki says, rolling his eyes. “My father was a giant.”

Thor blinks, looking startled, before laughing.

“Ase, not all Jotnars are giants. And I can tell you right now your father wasn’t.”

Loki feels his skin prickle in annoyance. “Why not?”

“Your too small.” He smiles at her. “And too pretty.”

“Oh,” Loki says dumbly. Heat rises to his cheeks.

Thor continues, not noticing. “I didn’t get to go many places, and the base I stayed at was mostly flat, but the mountains surrounding it were beautiful. Jotunheim was so…blue. The mountains were made out of cobalt, you see, so it was like you were surrounded by a blue ocean. It always seemed like a fight between the snow and the mountains. During the day you were blinded by the whiteness of the land, but at night the mountains would shine. The snow was determined to eat up the cobalt but sometimes it was the other way around. In no other land have I seen a blue quite like it.”

“Wow,” Loki breathes.

“Yeah.”

“I bet your eyes are as blue.”

“What?”

“Nothing. What was the base like?”

And here, Thor’s face goes as dark as a storm cloud.

“Hel.”

Loki doesn’t like the troubled expression on his face. “Because of…Tyr?”

“He gave me the worst jobs. The worst room. The worst night watch. I almost went crazy. I had nightmares about the things he made me do.”

“Like what?”

And the mask goes up. Thor’s face is expertly blank.

“I shouldn’t have said.”

_He’s not getting off that easy._

Loki pulls on Thor’s hand. He scowls with a scowl that says

_I’m not going to budge_

“Like what?”

“I don’t think you would like it.”

“That doesn’t matter.” Loki scowls, tugging on Thor’s hand again. “Or what, I’m not old enough to know?”

Thor sighs.

“You know if you just told me, I wouldn’t have to make a big deal about this.”

“He made me work in the death pits.” Thor finally says, after a moment of silence. “Bodies of civilians we couldn’t afford to leave laying around, on account of disease and pests. I would go in and cover them in sulfur powder. It made them burn faster, supposedly. Most diseases aren’t transmissible between Jotnar and Aesir but I got a terrible rash one day. For a week I just stayed in the wine cellar, covered in blisters and boils. I thought I was going to die. I’m sure Tyr prayed for it. Can you imagine how embarrassing that would’ve been for me? Dying, not in battle, but because of my assigned job on the base? Because of a mere pestilence?” Thor’s eyes are far away. “But the Gods must favor me because I pulled through. And what reward did I get for surviving?” Thor laughs bitterly. “Not even a day after I recovered Tyr sent me back to the pits.” Thor looks at her then, knowing. “Back to the dark matter where he wished to lose me forever.”

Loki is horrified. “Was this…recently?”

Thor looks at her strangely. “No. I told you. I was sent to Jotunheim when I was twelve.”

“I know you told me that!” Loki snaps. “But I didn’t think…” Loki trails off. “You did that at twelve?” He asks hopelessly.

Thor looks at her carefully. “I did worse than that. I killed people at that age.”

“But that isn’t right!” Loki explodes, unable to stand it anymore. “Your father shouldn’t have sent you. And your brother…where does he get off doing that to you? You were a child, Thor!”

Thor only shrugs, unmoved. “There are a lot of things that aren’t right in this world. Think of how many boys died in my stead. I count myself lucky.”

“No.” Loki shakes his head. “No. Just because you survived – it doesn’t negate what happened to you. Repeat after me – it wasn’t right.”

Thor scoffs. “I’m not-“

“Save yourself time arguing, and say it.”

Blue eyes meet green, and the green doesn’t flinch. Thor sighs.

“It wasn’t right.”

“What they did to me, it wasn’t right.”

“What they did to me,” Thor repeats, “wasn’t right.”

“It wasn’t fair.”

“It wasn’t fair.”

“I didn’t deserve it.”

“I didn’t deserve it.”

“I was just a child.”

There is a strange mix of emotions of Thor’s face that Loki can’t read. For a second he thinks Thor won’t say it.

“I was…just a child.”

“And my brother Tyr can choke on donkey dick.”

Thor bursts out laughing.

“I’m serious, Thor.” Loki says, heated. “I mean it. I didn’t say it as a joke. If I could, if he was here, I would kill him, Thor. I would kill him for all the Hel he’s put you through.”

Thor just keeps laughing, burying his head into the crook of Loki’s neck.

“God, Ase, you are just so-“ Thor breaks into laughter again, unable to find the words.

There is silence for a while, as Thor catches his breath, until he speaks again.

I’ve never told anyone this before,” he says, voice hidden in Loki’s hair, “but I think I can tell you. Your hair is thick enough to keep this secret.” Loki elbows him. Thor laughs quickly again, before going quiet.

“I still dream of the pit, even today. Even more than the battles or the burnings or the people I’ve killed – I remember what it was like to be in the pit, surrounded by the dead, and to think that I was dead too. That I was in Hel. Their eyes would pop like balloons after long freezes. And their guts were strewn about like wrapping paper. Like streamers. I’d step on mothers and children and fathers and sometimes I wouldn’t even know what I was stepping on, because anything that marked them otherwise was shriveled up in the cold. You don’t forget things that happen to you when you’re young. When you’re young and impressionable and made out of fear. And I have never forgotten. None of them.”

Loki can't see Thor’s face, but there is something in his voice. Something naked and thin and haunting. It doesn’t sound like the Thor Loki knows. It sounds like a child telling his worst fears come to life.

Loki doesn’t say anything. There is nothing he can say that will make it better. Instead, he holds Thor tight to him, combs his fingers through his hair.

Sometimes a gesture speaks louder than words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kinda close to them ~making loveeee~


	9. Good Times

After that, the days pass better than they should.

Thor is no longer restless. For all the childish and annoying things about the girl, Thor rather likes Ase. She’s smart when she wants to be, endlessly clever, has a mouth like a whip, and most of all, she makes him laugh.

It’s strange how being in Ase’s company makes him aware of how little he laughs in Asgard. But at the same time it only makes sense – someone as innocent as Ase could never be in a place like the capital. Though she is endlessly educated in some areas, she lacks an understanding of more basic ideas. It makes sense, though, when you think about how she was raised alone, with no other contact besides her sisters. Ase is not someone used to human interaction.

Thor slowly begins to regard her in the same ranks as Volstagg and his other trusted allies. Though not nearly as useful, considering she can in no way support his claim to the throne, he enjoys her company and her ridiculous antics always make him laugh.

Usually.

A small part of Thor grows alarmed at how he’s getting used to the nothingness. Where Thor used to grind his teeth endlessly thinking of ways to get out of the abandoned village, thinking of other things he could be doing – now he finds he doesn’t mind at all.

On one of these days, Ase invites him to go the river with her.

“Aren’t you bored of staying inside all day?” Ase asks him, her head hanging upside down from the bed, hair touching the floor, her feet on the wall.

Thor thinks she does this purposefully so her dress rucks up more, and tries to ignore it.

“I don’t stay inside all day.” He protests, eating at the table. “Sometimes I go outside and watch you hang the clothes on the line.”

Ase rolls her eyes, unimpressed. “Okay then, let me rephrase that: Aren’t you bored of staying by my hut all day?”

Thor doesn’t stand a chance.

Ase puts her hair in a side braid ponytail and wears another navy blue dress for the occasion.

Thor tugs on the skirt. “You wear blue a lot more often these days. Why’s that?” He asks, and Ase blushes for some unfathomable reason.

“It’s my favorite color, is all.” She says, looking at her feet.

“You told me you didn’t have a favorite color,” Thor replies back, bewildered.

“Well, I do now, Mr. Officer.” Ase says, rolling her eyes. “Jeez. Can we stop with the interrogation now?”

Ase sticks her hand out at him impatiently.

“Ase.” Thor sighs. “I’m walking with the broom as a crutch. If we hold hands, I’m only going to slow you down.”

“I don’t care,” Ase says stubbornly. “I want to walk with you. Why else would I have invited you?”

“Ase-“

Ase pouts, and Thor is beholden.

They hold hands all the way to the river, Ase obnoxiously happy the whole way.

“Isn’t it such a nice day?” she gushes, swinging their hands back and forth.

Thor is sweating from the effort of walking and only grunts back in response.

“Remind me why I’m going to this river again? I can't swim because of my leg, so what’s the point?”

“The point,” Ase says pretentiously, “is a change of _scenery_. It can help you recover faster. And anyway,” she sniffs, “you can still stick your feet in the water.”

“While you swim.” Thor says, dead-eyed.

“Exactly!” Ase beams at him. “Now you’re getting it.”

When they get to the river, however, Thor grudgingly admits to himself it was worth the walk. There are trees on either side of it, cherry blossoms falling into the water, and flowers of every kind growing on the edges.

He’ll die before he admits it to Ase though. She already has an ego the size of the sun. He doesn’t need to inflate it any more.

Ase disappears somewhere into the water and Thor lays back on the grass, the smell of lavender permeating everything.

 _This must be where she gets the flowers for her baths_ , he thinks.

Laying in the grass, his body surrounded by flowers, the sound of the stream steady in his ears, the sun hitting the back of his eyelids – Thor thinks he’s never been so at peace, and so off guard.

 _19 years_ , Thor thinks, _and not one have I felt a peace like this. Not one where I wasn’t worried about this or that or what brother was trying to kill me or what would be the next best move to try and claim the throne._

But here in the hollow, Thor is mindless. There is not a single thought in his head. Everything feels right.

_I wonder if this is what it will feel like when I win the throne?_

There is a loud splash and giggling, and Thor opens his eyes.

Ase is walking on some rocks in the middle of the river where the current is the strongest, trying to get to the other side.

He narrows his eyes.

“Be careful!” He yells at her. “Those rocks are probably slippery.”

Ase hops on to another rock and wobbles dramatically, waving her hands like a windmill. She laughs at him.

If it were anyone else, he wouldn’t be worried. But Ase has a knack for doing stupid things.

“I’m serious, Ase!”

Ase drops the charade and rolls her eyes at him. She places a hand on her hip.

“As if I would-“

She slips.

One second she’s giving him attitude, and the next, she’s wobbling, falling into the water with a loud splash.

Thor’s heart almost beats straight of his chest.

“Ase!” He screams, but she doesn’t bob up and out of the water to tell him he’s overreacting.

 _She can swim right?_ He thinks, having heart palpitations _. She told me she could swim. I could’ve sworn – she told me right?_

But every second that Thor waits for her to rise out of the water is another second she doesn’t.

“Shit.” Thor curses.

He looks at where the rocks are, and knows he will never make it walking.

_It’ll take too long._

So instead he dives in.

-

The current takes him.

It’s easier to work his leg in the water but that doesn’t mean it’s not painful.

It’s only once he gets to the rocks that he sees Ase further downstream, her head above water, until another current sends her back under.

_Fuck._

Thor dives back under, knows he’ll go faster, pushes his arms forward to the point that they burn from the effort.

Ase looks like a ragdoll being tossed and turned in the choppy tides.

When he finally grabs hold of her he think he’s never felt a relief so sweet.

Thor wraps one arm around her waist and uses his other arm to grab hold of a branch and pull them to shore.

Ase splutters like a wet cat on the grass, her hair sticking to her face and her dress plastered to her body like a second skin. Thor collapses on top of her, bone deep exhausted, trying to catch his breath.

Ase pushes at his chest with tiny fists.

“Thor,” she whines, “you’re heavy-“

Thor snaps.

He grabs a hold of her shoulders and shakes her like a ragdoll.

“Are you CRAZY?!”

Ase blinks back at him, wide eyed.

“Thor, wha-“

“What the **_Hel_** , Ase! What in the nine hells were you even thinking! I told you to be careful! I told you that the rocks were slippery. Can you even _swim?_ ”

“W-well,” Ase stutters, unnerved by his anger. “I’ve been practicing.”

“Practicing? _Practicing?”_

“I mean, yeah.” Ase says nervously. “How else would I get good at it?”

Thor looks at her, incredulous.

“You are so _stupid_.” At Ase’s hurt look, Thor just shakes his head. He finds that he is really, truly upset. “What would’ve happened if I wasn’t here? You would’ve _drowned_ , Ase. As a matter of fact, how many times have you almost died since I came here? First, that man tried to kill you. And then the river almost killed you. And nine hells, I shouldn’t even have to tell you this, it’s common fucking sense - **but you don’t save random people from the forest, Ase!** What if I had been a bad person? What would you have done then?”

_I was going to kill you, Ase. I was going to kill you. And you saved me. And you treated me so good. And I was going to kill you, still._

It strikes a fear in him, at just how vulnerable this girl is. This girl, with ivory skin like paper. With her small wrists and her too trusting nature and her collarbone that Thor could pop like a button. That anyone could break and bruise and shatter with just a touch.

“For fucks sake, what kind of sisters would leave you here? All alone, where you’re liable to be killed by bandits and thieves and rapists? I could kill them for leaving you like this, Ase! I could stick my sword into their stomachs and watch them bleed out for what they’ve done to you!”

He’s breathing hard by the end of his rant, his face screwed up tight like a fist, fury and fear held close to his chest like a poison. And it alarms him, really, that fear he holds, when usually he holds fear for nothing.

Ase is pale white beneath him, speechless.

So he just shakes his head and hobbles to his broom.

-

The walk back to Ase’s hut is a silent one.

Ase tries to talk to him but he ignores her.

_This is what you get for being so stupid. For not listening to me. If it wasn’t for me, you’d be dead ten times over by now._

_How did she even_ live _before me?_

It’s only once they get back to the hut and Thor is still not talking to her, that tears form in Ase’s glittering eyes.

“Thor, you can't just not talk to me.”

Thor ignores her, sitting on the cot.

“Thor, I know you’re upset with me. I know what I did was stupid. I know I should’ve listened to you. You were scared, weren’t you?”

Thor doesn’t answer.

“I promise I’ll never do it again. I promise. I’m sorry, Thor. Really, I’m sorry.” And finally, her voice cracks.

“Thor?”

And she looks so lonely standing there in the middle of the hut, so small and helpless, her hands fisted at her sides, that Thor can't help but soften.

_She’s so dumb. She’s such an idiot, but it isn’t her fault, not really. It’s her sisters. For leaving her here alone, with no one else to teach her different, to teach her not to trust, and be so soft, and other common sense things._

-

Thor stares at him so coldly, his face void of any expression, that for a second, for a long, fearful second, Loki fears he’s not going to say anything at all.

“Come here,” he says finally, face still expertly blank, and Loki takes a nervous step forward, and another and another, until Thor reaches his arms around Loki and pulls him tight into an embrace.

Thor holds him so tight he can hardly breathe.

“You scared me,” is all he says breathlessly into Loki’s ear. He presses tighter. “Never scare me like that again.”

“I won’t,” Loki says back, holding Thor just as tight, relieved.

_He doesn’t hate me. And if he doesn’t hate me, that’s all that matters._

“I promise I won’t. I’m sorry.”

-

But Thor doesn’t need a sorry.

Just holding Ase to him is enough. Feeling her heart beat beneath his chest, proof of life, is all he needs.

* * *

 _He likes me_ , Loki thinks to himself. _He must like me, even just a bit, if he was THAT worried when I fell._

Loki hadn’t understood at first, just why Thor was so upset. Loki had been planning to use seidr to slow down the current and safely get to shore when he saw Thor upstream.

It was how Loki practiced. He couldn’t swim completely, but if something went wrong, he could use seidr to get safely to shore. But obviously, once he saw Thor upstream, he couldn’t use seidr in front of him.

He was so upset it had scared Loki. He tried to rationalize this fear in his mind, tried to tell himself he was only scared of Thor hating him because it would mess up his plans, but deep down Loki already knew his plan was derailing, was splitting at the seams, and all because a pathetic part of him needed Thor to need him back.

Loki tried to reign in his happiness at Thor admitting he was scared Loki had hurt himself.

_Because it won’t matter what he thinks, when I kill him._

_(And I will kill him, right?)_

-

When the full moon came again, Loki knew it was time. He had spent too much time diddle dallying with Thor and playing at family.

_Herkja would laugh at you for your fondness, for your weakness to him. And then she would cut him to pieces in front of you, just because she can. Just to prove to you what weakness costs._

That day, he told Thor he was going to Upsala.

Thor wrinkled an eyebrow at her, concerned.

_Cute. As if there was anything in the world that I would have to fear in Upsala._

But it seemed Loki’s escapade in the river had only confirmed Thor’s ideas of her brainlessness. Every time she wanted to go somewhere Thor would look at her as if she were fine china.

“Why?” He asked, tone suspicious, but most of all worried.

Of all the things Loki found uselessly endearing in this village idiot, Loki had not endeared to the fact that Thor now acted as if he was his father.

_That’s not how you’re supposed to look at me. I don’t want you to look at me that way at all._

Which was the precise reason he was going to ‘Upsala.’

“It’s a surprise.” Loki said mischievously, Thor unknowing to the fact that his true destination was the main compound.

“Your surprises usually end up with you almost dead,” Thor said dryly in reply and Loki laughed.

“Trust me,” Loki said smirking, “you’ll like this surprise.”

-

When Loki gets to the compound all of the sisters are lounging about, hanging off windowsills and propped up against walls, blood lust on their faces, all eagerly waiting for night to fall and their next meal to fall into their laps.

“If it isn’t boy Loki,” one of the sisters says nastily, and the other chime in, like predators surrounding their prey.

“Loki-boy,” sing songs one of the other sisters, “if we have no men tonight, will we be forced to share you?”

“I wouldn’t touch him with a ten foot pole,” another says, nose wrinkling. “He’s an eyesore. A cock and a cunt? What God did he piss off?”

They all jump off their windowsills and walls, surrounding him like they always do, pulling at his hair and his dress.

“It’s such a shame. Lilith split you in half and now you aren’t even a decent girl or a man. You’re too pretty to suit any lass. And your body is too boyish to suit any man.”

Loki feels his face burn.

“Shut up, Finna.” Loki snaps. “At least I don’t turn into a hag when the sun rises like you.”

The other sisters titter with laughter and Finna colors, her face twisted in hate.

She thrusts a hand at his throat and squeezes.

“You better watch your mouth, Loki-boy. Or else I’ll have Herkja lock you in the pit again for four weeks this time, and you’ll be forced to grow back all your toes in the dark.”

It if were Herkja saying it, Loki would be struck with bone deep chill. But it is only Finna, and she holds no authority.

Loki rakes his nails across Finna’s face and she cries out, bleeding.

“I’ve been practicing charms you see, Finna,” Loki tells her, flexing his hand, as she cowers before him. “There’s a way to keep a witch from growing her eyes back.” He looks at her sharply. “You better be careful I don’t decide to take them from you forever.”

And to the others girls, watching them

“That goes for the rest of you as well!”

And the sisters disperse, go back to their places on the window sills and walls.

“…always been nasty, that Loki-boy…”

“Just like his nature, his magic is unnatural…”

“Herkja will sort him out. She always sorts him out.”

“Bitch.”

The sisters makes ugly faces at him, and he makes ugly faces back, until finally he reaches Herkja’s hut.

The door swings open before he even gets to knock.

“I need a makeover.”

-

Herkja covers his eyes with khol, while another witch dyes his lips red with cranberries.

“All this, for a boy? Was your face not enough?”

Loki colors, ashamed. He doesn’t want to talk about his lacking in front of another witch other than Herkja, but because of the situation, he’s forced to.

“He’s used to Capital girls.” Loki says, trying to keep the bitterness out of his voice. “He says I look like a child, with my body and my small tits.”

The other witch attending to Loki looks to Herkja curiously. He thinks her name is Brunhilde.

“Is this the boy you felt cross the border the other day?” Brunhilde asks.

Loki stares at Herkja, surprised. “You knew?”

Herkja looks at him as if he’s acting foolish. “Of course I knew. I made that forest with my blood, boy. It is a part of me. You don’t think I would feel it if an ant wandered over hand?”

“Oh,” is all Loki says, and he does feel foolish. “Why didn’t you – you – you never said anything.”

Herkja looks at him carefully. “I was waiting to see what you would do. I was going to visit you soon, you know. You kept that boy a suspicious amount of time.”

And Herkja looks at him so sharply, as if staring into his very soul, that Loki fears stupidly that she can see what’s engraved in his very heart.

“It’s only because he didn’t like me at first,” Loki says, and it’s not even really a lie. “That’s why this has taken so long.”

Brunhilde looks at Loki with mischievous eyes. “I have seen your ward, Loki, and he is no mere boy. He is a man, if I ever saw one.”

“He doesn’t look like a man. Not like the men you all have.”

Brunhilde rolls her eyes at him. “Those are shells of men, Loki. Of course you wouldn’t know better, though. A man such as yours is wasted on you.” She smiles, showing all her teeth. “You should give him to me.”

Loki feels a sting of anger run up his spine so suddenly he’s surprised he doesn’t jerk forward.

“No.” He snaps. “He’s mine.”

Brunhilde looks disappointed with his response, turns to Herkja.

“Sister, please. Why is it that Loki gets such a fine specimen, when he has never even bedded a man? Loki has said so himself that the man likes busty _women_ like myself. We have a new batch of loggers coming through tonight. Let Loki have one of them.”

And Loki can't believe the nerve of Brunhilde to ignore him like that, to try and supersede him by talking to Herkja. It fills him with an anger so indescribable he foams at the mouth.

“No, I will not take a _logger_ , Brun.” He sneers, teeth flashing like a warning. “ _You’re_ not the one who found him. You’re not the one who _saved_ him. And you’re not the one he gives a flying _fib_ about.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. A little knowing smile forms on Brunhilde’s face.

“Oh, my~” Brun croons. “It seems our little Loki-boy has a little _crush._ ”

Loki blushes all the way to his roots. “I do not.” He snarls.

Brunhilde laughs, all jagged edges. “You think your ward would still care about you, knowing what you truly are? You think he would still fuck you if you had your little dick between your legs?”

“Shut up,” Loki snarls, and he’s horrified to find tears forming at the corners of his eyes. “Shut **_up_**.”

“You think he’ll finally want you with this paint on your face?” Brun laughs. “Give me a break. A man like your ward needs a real woman. Not a child. Not a half thing. I’ll go to your hut when your not there and slip onto his dick, the way a little boy like you would never know how, and I’ll ride him harder than likely any woman has in their lives, my fat pussy swallowing up his dick and my tits slapping his face, the way yours could _never_ , and it’ll be my name he’ll be screaming Loki-boy, not yours-“

“I said SHUT UP!” Loki screams, tackling Brunhilde to the ground, his hand wrapped tight against her throat. He smashes her head against the wood flooring again and again and again.

“You don’t know anything! You don’t know anything about Thor! You don’t know anything about the way he feels about me! And you don’t know anything,” Loki says, enunciating his words with every slam of her head against the floor boards, “about how people with actual _hearts_ can care about other people!”

Loki raises Brunhilde’s head to slam against the floor again but a hand on his wrist stops him.

Herkja looks at him. “Stop,” she says. “She’s dead.”

And Loki realizes, blithely, that she’s right.

Brun’s body hangs limp like a doll his hand, blood all over the floorboards, her brown eyes staring lifelessly as the ceiling.

“Oh.” Loki blinks, lets go of Brunhilde, and she flops like a fish to the floor.

“She’ll be upset when she wakes.” Herkja tells him knowingly. “It’ll take her three days to come back. The full moon will be gone by then. She will not have any meal because of you.”

“She shouldn’t have talked to me like that,” Loki mutters.

“You do realize you have to kill this boy, right?” Herkja asks him, questioning.

Loki startles, looks up into her eyes, and sets his face neutral.

“Yes.” He says quietly.

“No matter how much he cares for you.”

“Yes.”

“No matter how much you care for him?”

“Yes.”

Herkja combs her fingers through his hair, and the motion would be comforting if she had not done so many times before with the intention to scalp him.

“Good.” She says, pleased. “You will kill this boy.”

“Or else I’ll kill you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i might stop here. idk. the smut scene is challenging me.
> 
> if not, the next chapter is where i'll stop so i can try and complete another work.


	10. All That Glitters is Not Gold

Thor is laying underneath the drying laundry, eating a green apple, when Loki appears like a dream.

One second, the sheets are fluttering in the wind like ghosts, and the next second, one of the sheets turns to Loki standing in front of him in a much nicer dress than Thor has ever seen her wear.

For a second, it’s like all the world has gone still.

Loki’s hair is braided intricately, half of it up and the other half down, trailing her back in her tight curls. Her eyes are lined with Kohl, emphasizing their sharpness, and the green that seems to burn bright back at him. Her lashes look even longer than usual, and her baby lips, usually a sweet soft pink, are now a deep red like pomegranate fruit. Her dress as well is much finer than usual, a low cut corset that presses her breasts up high and tight so that it looks like she actually has some. The dress itself is a pale lilac pink, with a skirt that actually falls to Loki’s ankles.

Loki twirls for him, happiness radiating out of her every pore.

“Well?” She asks him, grinning. “What do you think?”

Thor chokes on an apple slice.

Ase’s eyes crinkle into worry as she bends down to help him.

She pats his back as Thor chokes, her little tits in his face, until finally Thor can breathe again.

“Nine hells Ase, what the actual _fuck?”_

Ase sits back on her haunches, her expression going unsure. She picks at the ends of her dress.

“You don’t like it?”

Thor has no idea exactly _what_ about her Ase’s referring to. There are so many things…not to like. Her breasts, maybe? They’re like pale moons held up by whalebone and velvet lace. Whether Thor likes them or not is besides the point.

“Ase,” he says, harsher than he intends. He tries to look anywhere but her breasts. “Don’t be stupid. Someone could have taken advantage of you dressed like that.”

He presses a thumb to her lips, and God, does she _really_ have to make _that_ face when he does it? Blinking her doe eyes like she’s under his spell?

Sure enough, the deep red comes off on his thumb, and when he puts it to his mouth, it tastes like pomegranate.

 _She’s wearing makeup_ , Thor thinks, dumbfounded _. And the black around her eyes, it must be kohl._

“Are we playing a game?” Ase asks breathlessly, obviously mistaking his actions for God knows what. “I wanna play too,” she says, and brings his thumb into her mouth, sucking on it obscenely, her eyes big and bright and focused on him.

And fuck if Thor’s dick doesn’t twitch.

 _Fucking stop it_ , Thor thinks, angry at himself. _This isn’t what is it between me and her. This isn’t…this isn’t how I really feel._

But another part of Thor, hidden away and ignored, thinks

_Why? What are you so afraid of? It’s not like you haven’t fucked girls her age before. What makes her so different? What makes her a **no**?_

“Fucking hell, Ase.” Thor berates, pulling his thumb out of her mouth, heart beating like wild. He’s trying to erase the image of his thumb on her mouth, the way her cheeks hollowed as she sucked. He’s trying to keep his dick down, most of all. “Are you crazy? What part of me not fucking you did you not understand? How many times do I have to say it before you get it through your goddamn brain?”

Ase blinks at him, something shattering in her eyes.

“But-,” and here her voice cracks, “I did it for you. Because you said – well you said I wasn’t woman enough for you. So I thought…” and she trails off, red faced with shame, pride upset, and Thor feels like the biggest piece of shit in the world.

Because it’s not like Ase isn’t attractive. And it isn’t even really that she’s a child, in anything but mentality. Would a child stare at him the way she stares at him, sometimes, eyes so full of heat? And touch him sometimes, the way she touches him, pretending it’s an accident. And even her body, though child-like compared to the girls in the capital, Thor must admit to himself – is no child’s. Maybe not quite a woman’s but forming itself in that image.

But he can't fuck her. He _can't_.

Because, what Thor would do to this girl, would that even be fucking?

_No. It would be-_

“Ase,” he says sharply instead. “I don’t think of you like that, understand? We’re not – we don’t have a relationship like that.” And then he says the biggest fucking lie. “Celibacy…” _God, this is such bullshit._ “…celibacy can be a very beautiful thing, you know?” He says, swallowing roughly, hoping she believe him. “Especially for a special girl like you-“

“Okay.” Ase says, her face blank, gathering her skirts in her hand to stand up.

 _Okay?_ Thor breathes a silent breathe of relief. _Okay._

“Cool. So we’re…so we’re cool right?”

“Crystal.” Ase throws behind her back, not even looking at him, going into the hut.

 _Cool._ Thor lays back on the grass, relief like a balm in his heart.

But it’s not cool.

When Ase comes back out, she’s mostly the same, except she’s traded the long skirt portion of her dress for something that barely goes past her thighs. She stalks right past Thor.

“Ase.” He says sharply. “Where are you going?”

Ase is applying more red to her lips, even more obscene than before.

“I’m going to Upsala.” She says blithely.

“Why?”

“To find a man to fuck me.”

Thor almost has a heart attack. He’s on his feet in an instant, stalking towards her and grabbing her tight by the wrist.

“Wrong,” Thor practically growls at her. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that. You’re going to start again, and tell me in nice, pretty, clean words what you were really going to say.”

Ase _hmms_ , as if thinking carefully. “Okay,” she finally says. “What I meant to say is I’m going to Upsala to fuck some poor man’s dick silly with my fat pussy until he creams in me.” She smiles bright and fake. “Happy?”

_Poor man’s dick…silly…fat pussy…cream…_

Thor can barely process the words Ase’s just spoken, so filthy, like the words a whore in a brothel would speak, and how does she know these horrible words? How does she know these horrible things? Ase, with the way she blushes over the insinuation of a simple kiss. Ase who is so shy when he teases her. Ase knows all these dirty words and with another man she’s going to…going to…

 _No_. She isn’t going to.

He wants to slap her. He really does.

“Ase,” he says sharply, sharper than the edge of Tyr’s favorite sword. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. You don’t know anything about how the world works, you’re sheltered, you’re a child in every way that counts-“

“But that’s just it!” Ase cries out, fury in her eyes. “I’m not, Thor! I’m not a child! No matter what you say I’m _sixteen_. You think I’ve never touched myself? You don’t think I have _urges_? You don’t think that sometimes at night I feel so hot and I just want someone to love me? You think a _child_ has those urges?”

Thor feels blood rush into his face, tries to keep the picture of Ase touching herself out of his mind.

“You think a cock is the same thing as your fingers?” He says harshly instead. “You think any of the men in Upsala are going to treat you with the same gentleness you treat yourself? How many fingers do you use? Two? You think that’s enough to prepare you?” Thor brings her hand up roughly, presses it against his own. His hand dwarfs her slender one.

“Look at how small your hands are. How delicate your fingers are.” Ase’s hands might as well just be for show. They’re utterly useless. And like the rest of her, utterly beautiful. “Those brutes in Upsala would break you, Ase! They would tear you apart! But you are just so _goddamn_ **stupid** that you don’t even _care_ -“

Ase tears herself away from his, chest heaving. “Don’t call me stupid! I’m sick of it! I’m sick of you always condescending to me, endlessly patronizing me. You don’t want to fuck me? Fine! You think I'm ugly, you think I’m a mountain troll? Fine! But there are men out there,” she says, eyes shining with unshed tears, “men who don’t think I'm ugly. Other men who would appreciate me. Other men who would make _love_ to me-“

Other men. She says it so confidently. As if Thor would let another man touch her. As if Thor would let another man love her. As if Thor would let her love another man.

Thor grabs her roughly by the jaw, stops her talking. Ase glares him down with burning emerald eyes.

“Other men.” He snarls. “What’s this talk of other men? You think I would ever let you go with another man? You think I would let you get eaten so? You who, for all your big talk, is nothing but a lamb?”

Ase eyes look into Thor’s knowingly. “Oh my~” She says sarcastically. “The mighty lion has declared me the lamb. Who then lion, if not the men in Upsala, is worthy of eating the lamb?” She asks mockingly, batting her lashes at him.

“You _stupid_ girl,” Thor spits, and Ase scowls again, dropping the teasing. “You want me to take your maidenhead?” Ase’s eyes dilate. “Fine. But you better wish to all nine gods that you don’t regret it.”

-

But Thor wants to make her regret it. He wants to scare her. He wants her to stop it before it happens.

He pulls her roughly into her own hut and throws her own the bed with little ceremony.

Ase’s skirts rise up on her hips and she blushes, because for all her big talk, she’s still a virgin.

Thor forces himself to laugh cruelly. “Aw, is the little girl _embarrassed?_ But you used such big words against me. Don’t tell me you’re regretting it now?”

But Ase only glares daggers at him, red still on her cheeks.

“I'm not embarrassed. And I'm not _scared_.”

_Just stop it. Stop being brave. Say no._

But she doesn’t say no and Thor grits his teeth, pulls off his belt in sharp and rough motions, Ase on the bed curled into herself, trying to put on a brave face, staring at him head on, and still looking for all the world like the little lamb that she is.

Thor takes off his trousers and the blush rises once again on Ase’s face, so achingly beautiful, but Thor tries not to focus on that, tries not to soften himself towards her like always, because he’s trying to scare her, he’s trying to make her want to stop.

He crawls on top of her with little ceremony and she follows his head with hers, trying to kiss him, eyes closed and lashes touching her cheeks, as if he’s something amazing, as if this is something romantic, and Thor roughly pushes her away.

Ase’s blinks up at him, eyes full of confusion.

“But I thought…”

“What? You thought we were going to kiss? You thought we were going to hold hands?” He looks down at her coldly. “You wanted to fuck Ase. Fucking doesn’t involve those things.”

He starts to lift up her skirts, move her clothes out of the way roughly.

“Thor…”

He ignores her.

“Thor stop.”

_This isn’t enough. I need her to be really upset with me. I need her to never want to do this again._

He handles her more roughly, tears out one of the pins in her hair, everything about him clinical and mean, as if she could be anybody, as if she weren’t anything but a doll, as if she doesn’t mean a single thing to him.

“STOP!”

Ase kicks him in the face with her foot and Thor almost falls off the bed.

Ase’s face is a mess. There are tears streaming down her face, her kohl running all over the place, her face splotchy and red and upset.

Thor thinks he’s never felt his heart so consciously in his chest before. And certainly not this ache.

He turns around from her, his back to her, sitting on the edge of the bed.

“See?” He says, his voice rough, but his hands are shaking. “Do you see how it is? Do you really want that? You don’t, Ase. You _don’t_. You should never – you should never have to-“

_You should never have to go through something like that._

_(but I just put you through that, didn’t I?)_

“Fuck.” Thor breathes out, presses his fist to his eyes. He feels like he could cry. It’s crazy. Nineteen years and he’s never cried once. But he feels like he could cry right now.

“Ase I didn’t- I didn’t want to-“

_But you did. But you did but you did but you **did**_

There is a long moment of silence where Thor’s body shakes like a tree in the wind, where he tries to hold it all in together, and in that moment Ase crawls towards him, silent as ever.

She touches his shoulder first, gently.

“Hey. _Hey_. It’s okay. I’m okay.”

_It’s not okay. None of it’s okay. This isn’t okay. The way I feel – it isn’t okay._

But Ase only presses closer, crawls on top of him, moves to straddle his lap, and Thor moans like a dying thing.

_Nine hells, if you weren’t so naive I’d be convinced you were the devil. You tempt me so._

Ase locks her arms around his neck, still on top of him, her tears dried and the moonlight streaming in from the windows behind her, illuminating her, a glowing thing, her hair in tangles again, as big as forest Thor wishes he could get lost in forever.

Ase presses a kiss to his forehead so sweetly Thor almost melts.

“Don’t cry, Thor. Don’t be upset.”

She presses another kiss to his neck, and then the corner of his lips, and Thor can’t help but moan again, helpless.

“Just make it up to me. Just make love to me like you promised.”

And how can Thor say no that?

How can Thor _ever_ say no to Ase?

-

Thor lays her back on the bed gently. He kisses the insides of her thighs, watching her as he does so, her green eyes lovelier than when the grass blooms in the spring, and Ase giggles.

“It tickles,” she says, still smiling endearingly. “What are you doing down there?”

Thor kisses her closer and closer to the apex of her thighs, eyes heavy with lust.

“I have to prepare you first.”

Ase blinks at him innocently. “Prepare…?”

Thor pulls down Ase’s panties, flicks his tongue where her clit is, and Ase shudders.

Her face is flushed again. “Oh…so you mean-“

“Hike your legs over my shoulders.” Thor commands, and Ase does so, her eyes dark with some deep emotion.

Thor takes a long lick in between her folds, slavishly devoted, like a dog to his master, grips her thighs as he tongues his way deeper, his face buried in her sweet pussy like there’s a treasure, like she’s divine, like everything he’s ever wanted lies in the apex of her thighs, and she’s the sweetest thing he’s ever tasted.

Ase whines, presses her pussy to his face, and Thor’s cock jumps at the sound, the bed providing a wonderful friction against his aching cock, an aching cock he wants to slam into Ase immediately, but he knows he must wait, and be patient, and make sure she is open to him first.

But Gods, Thor thinks he could eat Ase out forever. He’s enveloped by her scent, everything lavender and so honey sweet, and she’s wetter than the ocean, his face covered in her juices, his tongue thrusting in and out of her pussy, her pink folds parted for him like the prettiest flower, and her hand wrapped tight in his hair, pushing him deeper, and Gods does he wish he could get lost there forever, slobbering over her like a dog, panting, and so desperate, and so hungry, so fucking hungry.

He feels it when she’s about to come, her body jumping like a live wire, shuddering, her voice crying out so beautifully, as she comes in his mouth and he swallows it all up like it’s honey.

He sinks his teeth into her thigh, sucks hard, leaves a purple flower that blooms.

Ase only whines at the touch, her pussy still open to him, glistening back at him, so goddamn wet.

Thor crawls back over her body and once again Ase’s mouth follows his, open to him like a baby bird desperate for food.

“Kiss me.” She says, eyes blown. She doesn’t even try to hide how distressed she sounds. “I want you to kiss me. Please.”

And so Thor kisses her, first on the lips, and then she opens her mouth to his, and his tongue follows, kisses her as deep as he can, as if he wants to swallow her whole, Ase’s tongue clumsy and desperate around his, everything about her so sloppy and eager, but the sloppiness she makes up with enthusiasm, and simply because she’s Ase.

“I'm going to fuck you now,” he whispers in her ear, and Ase whines, presses closer to him like a cat in heat.

He pulls down his undergarment and takes himself in his hand, the other arm on the bed, holding himself over Ase.

“You’re drinking your moon tea right?”

“Yes.” Ase says breathlessly.

“And you’re sure you want this?”

“Yes.”

“Because once I'm inside…I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop.”

Ase only stares up at him, stars in her eyes, and Thor really wishes she wouldn’t look at him like that.

“I don’t want you to stop.”

Thor’s cock twitches and he has to swallow roughly to keep a moan from coming out.

He presses his cock against her entrance and presses in and

_Gods it is tight._

He’s eaten her out, worked her open with his fingers, and still her cunt is the tightest thing Thor has ever been inside.

He takes deep breathes, not moving, trying to calm himself, even though his dick is about ready to explode.

Loki cries out beneath him.

“Thor, it’s too big!”

Thor feels his dick swell. He curses.

“Shit, Ase!” He says against gritted teeth. He bends his head to her chest, forehead sweating with the exertion of holding himself back. “You can’t say things like that!”

Ase only wails. “Why’d it get bigger!”

Thor clenches his jaw, a muscle twitching on his forehead as he moves as slow as he can.

Ase, with her legs wrapped around his waist, starts to kick his back.

“Stop!” She cries out. “Stop moving! It _hurts_ , Thor. You’re too big. You’ll break me. You have to take it out.”

Thor almost dies of a heart attack right then.

“What?” He feels dazed. “Ase, I can't take it out right now. And even if I could, it probably hurt more than if I started moving.”

“I don’t care!” Ase snaps, kicking his back again. “Take it out! It’s too big! You’re going to tear me apart. I won't ever be able to walk again, ever!”

“Ase, Ase, darling-“ He tries to calm her down, soothe her, presses kisses to her forehead all the while he’s seeing stars with how hard his dick is, can barely breathe with his balls so tight, ready to slap against her ass. “It’s just now. The pain is just for now since it’s your first time. But once I start to move you’ll like it.”

Ase’s lip wobbles, everything about her scared and vulnerable. “You promise?” She whispers.

He kisses her. “I promise.”

Ase waits a long time before she nods her head, and she does it so slowly that Thor’s cock nearly dies right then.

As soon as she gives him the authority, he thrusts his dick all the way in, deep into her, tighter and hotter than when stars collide, and Thor nearly comes right then, all that beautiful pressure exerted on his cock, as Ase cries out, tears filling in her crystal green eyes.

She kicks him hard in the back.

“You said it wouldn’t hurt!” She says through her tears.

He kisses her again, tries to soften her to him, kisses her on her forehead and eyes and neck and collarbone, Ase trying to dodge him the whole time.

“And it won't. Not anymore. You’ll like it.” He tries to reassure her. “And you took it so good, kitten. You took my cock so good. You’re such a good girl, baby. I'm so proud of you.”

And one of those words must be a switch for her because Ase’s cunt tightens around him, her eyes only a thin ring of green, and Thor snarls, makes some animal sound, bites into her neck roughly, the feeling of her walls pressing against his dick everything.

Ase cries out. She looks at him, face still wet with tears.

“Say it again.” She says breathlessly.

“You’re such a good girl,” he slobbers into her mouth, presses his tongue against hers, drunk on everything about her, starts to piston his hips into her at a steady rhythm, his sound of his balls smacking against her ass obscene and loud in the room. “My good girl. My everything.”

Ase looks up at him though her lashes with wet eyes, eyes heavy with lust.

“Your good girl?”

“ _My_ good girl.” He says sharply, leaving no room for doubt, and then bending down to take a breast into his mouth. He suckles at her tit like a child would, sucks as hard as he can, runs his tongue around her nipple, and then bites down.

Ase keens, presses her legs tight around him as Thor starts to slam into her even faster.

Ase’s breasts jiggle with the force of his thrusts, perfectly pert with small pink nipples, the prettiest tits he’s ever seen in his life.

Ase catches him staring, tries to cover her tits with her hands but Thor doesn’t let her, covers her hands with his own and presses them above her head.

“I know they’re not big.” She whispers, her eyes avoiding his, and Thor wants to shake her for her foolishness, at the way she doesn’t notice how beautiful everything about her is.

“They’re perfect.” He says, staring into her eyes with all the authority that comes with being an arrogant bastard. “Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise.”

He’s fucking her in earnest now, Ase whining and moaning beneath him, pressing tighter against him, meeting his thrusts with her own, jerking her little hips toward him, so desperate for contact, so desperate for touch, everything about her glowing and flushed and beautiful.

Thor is the beast above her, nothing about him gentle, nothing about him beautiful, pistoning his hips faster and faster, snarling and growing and holding her tight to him, everything that’s not Ase obliterated when he’s balls deep in her sweet pussy, wishes he could die like this, wishes he could explode against her and become one.

With one last brutal thrust to Ase’s hips Thor comes, everything in his vision white for a second, like he’s gone and died and just now come back to life, and then Ase’s coming as well, unraveling beneath him, her legs falling from him like pale ribbon, her body beautifully flushed, baby bird delicate in the moonlight.

She looks up at him and smiles, pure unadulterated happiness, holding nothing back, raw and naked and totally exposed and Thor thinks

_This is why. This is why I didn’t want to do this. This is why I treated her like a child. This is why I ignored her advances. This is why I pretended like I didn’t want to fuck her._

_Because how could I ever just do this once?_

-

Loki knows, after Thor makes love to him, that he won’t be able to kill him.

Thor rests besides him on the bed, dead asleep, his chest rising and falling and so achingly handsome and regal.

Loki runs a hand through the hair he loves so much and almost cries.

_I could never hurt you. Never._

There’s a knife underneath is pillow that he was planning to use after Thor fell asleep. But here Loki is now, holding it in his hand, gleaming silver in the moonlight, wicked and sharp, and Loki knows he won't be able to use it.

 _I have to let him go. I have to convince the witches to let him go. He’s the son of a baron right? It’s a rule of Herkja’s to never go after nobles or royalty. Kicks up too much of a fuss. She’ll_ **have** _to let him go._

Loki puts the knife back under his pillow and very slowly gets out of bed without waking Thor.

_I have to talk to her. I have to talk to her now._

-

The screaming is terrible.

Loki starts to hear it when he’s not even hundred leagues from the compound. He pulls his cloak tighter across his body and walks into Herkja’s hut without even knocking.

Herkja, as expected, has already killed her prey.

The man in question lays in a pool of his own blood, Herkja’s knife still in her hand.

She snaps her eyes to Loki.

“What are you doing here?” She asks sharply, her red hair like fire framing her face.

“I can’t kill him,” Loki says, and that’s when all Hel breaks loose.

-

Herkja’s eyes narrow to knife slits. “What do you mean you can't kill him? Has he somehow escaped you?”

“I mean, I _won't_ kill him.” Loki says stubbornly, his gaze unwavering from Herkja’s, his fists clenched at his sides.

Herkja stares at him. “You won't kill him?” She says it, almost, as if reminding herself of what Loki has said. Herkja stands, blood all over clothes, knife still in hand. She starts towards Loki.

“You know the price you must pay, then, correct?”

Loki stutters backwards, his back hitting the wall. His heart is beating like a wild thing in his chest.

“Herkja he’s the son of a baron! He’s _a noble._ Remember your rule about nobles? _Remember?”_

Herkja just laughs, her head thrown back, her teeth glinting in the lamp light, unbelieving.

“Oh really? What is the name of this so called Baron? Perhaps I may recognize it.”

“Thor,” Loki says defiantly. “His name is Thor. I don’t- I don’t know his last name but a first name like that has got to be pretty rare.”

Herkja goes still at the name, her laugh cutting off, something flashing in her eyes that Loki can’t quite put her finger on.

Herkja looks at him strangely. Suspicious.

“Where did you hear that name?”

“I'm not lying to you, Herkja. It’s his name.”

Herkja moves closer, begins to circle him unconsciously. Her face is a perfect mask, giving away nothing.

“And you don’t…you don’t recognize that name?”

Loki stares at Herkja, wonders what she’s playing at.

“Should I?” He spits back.

“No,” Herkja says quickly. Almost too quickly. “No, you shouldn’t. You’re right. That boy is a…noble. His family is well recognized. You should let him go immediately. There’s a reason we stick to old loggers passing through. Anything more and we could get into quite a bit of…trouble.” Herkja straightens, determination settling in her spine. She moves away from Loki with a purpose. “Get rid of him.” She says with a wave of her hand. “I want him gone by tomorrow – no – tonight. Boys like him should have never made it through my woods in the first place. The fact that he did speaks volumes. The boy’s dangerous but I shouldn’t be too surprised.” Herkja’s eyes flicker to Loki’s. “You always did have a knack for endangering us.”

Loki grits his teeth, struggles against not saying anything. He’s about to leave when Herkja’s voice stops him.

“Oh, and Loki?”

Loki turns.

Herkja is on the floor again, leaning over her prey, her knife cutting into his heart. She pauses to look at Loki.

“You’ll know you’ll have to be punished for this, right?” She says, and Herkja’s knife winks at her.

_How many toes, how many eyes, how many fingers will it be this time? Or maybe this time, they’ll even take out my heart and feed it to the wolves._

“I know,” Loki says quietly.

And Herkja smiles, achingly lovely, a Venus flytrap with teeth.

“Good.” She says. “ _Good._ ”

-

Loki rushes back to his hut, his cloak fluttering behind him, feeling higher than a kite.

_He’ll live. I don’t have to kill him. The other won’t kill him. Herkja is letting him go. And maybe…just maybe…he can take me with him. Maybe he can take me out of this Hel. Maybe we can leave together._

Loki feels lighter than he has all his sixteen years of life.

_Wouldn’t that be something, to leave this place? To see the world? And wouldn’t it be nice if Thor could show me it?_

Loki slows as he reaches his hut, opens the door quietly, his heart dropping all the way down to his shoes when he sees the bed is empty. The hut is empty.

 _He left_. Loki thinks despondently. _He just…left. Without even saying goodbye. Without even saying a thing._

Loki moves, almost like a zombie, to his bed, and sits down, staring at nothing.

_But…why?_

A thought crawls into Loki’s head, a bad thought, a nasty thought, and Loki feels sick, reaches under his pillow and –

“Looking for this?”

Thor comes out of the shadows fully clothed, trousers and black military boots, his dress shirt with golden buttons across the shoulders, the clothes he was wearing when Loki found him, and Loki thinks, stupidly

_How did I never guess he was a noble?_

But the worst thing, the worst thing about it all is the knife in his hands, Loki’s knife, glinting silver in the light, it’s blade sharper than a serpent’s tooth.

“Thor-“ Loki starts desperately, but Thor cuts him off.

He’s a sight to see standing there, everything about him so handsome, the cut of his jaw and his shoulders, his sapphire eyes and golden crown of hair, and everything about him so dangerous, how could Loki ever forget he was so dangerous, as cold as a Jotunheim winter staring at him, like Loki’s a stranger, like Loki’s nothing to him.

“Ave Malefica.” Those are the words, inscribed in latin, on every witches blade. “Hail to the witch.”

Loki feels like crying.

“Thor, please, let me explain-“

“I didn’t believe it at first,” Thor interrupts, cutting into him. He doesn’t look at Loki, instead fiddles with the things on his dresser, trails a finger on his table. “These loggers filed a complaint you see, to my father. Unfortunately for them, they only had me as an audience. I didn’t believe them, you see, because their story was riddled with inconsistencies. The couldn’t remember the faces of the girls. The couldn’t remember their names. When I asked about the spell cast, they all had different responses. The one thing they did seem to remember, however, the one thing they all agreed upon, were the words inscribed into their blades. _Ave Malefica_. Hail to the witch.”

Loki’s lip wobbles. “I don’t understand,” he whispers. “Why would they go to you? Why would they go to your father? Why not go to the king?”

Thor is silent, watches him. He pulls something from his neck and throws it to him. Loki catches it.

“I hid it from you when you found me. I didn’t trust you. I see now I was right not to.”

It is a necklace Loki holds in his hands, a singular pendant attached to it. When Loki turns it over he sees a sword engraved, a golden sun raised behind it, and the words _imperii Gloria_ inscribed.

Glory to the empire.

The necklace that marks each of Odin’s sons.

Realization strikes Loki like a lightning bolt. He looks up at Thor, shocked.

“You…you are the son of…”

_Emperor Odin. Odin the Matchless. Witches Bane._

_Is this is why Herkja agreed so easily? Because she knew? She knew he was a prince. And she knew who his father was._

Thor smiles tightly. “Yes. That’s right. I’m an Odinson. I'm one of his thirteen bastard boys. But who are you? I think that’s the thing I’d most like to know. Who in the nine hells are _you?”_

“Thor,” Loki tries, voice shaking. “You know who I am. I’m – you named me. I’m Ase. I’m your Ase.”

Some indescribable emotion passes through Thor’s face before he closes himself again, gritting his teeth.

“Stop. Just stop. You won't get to me like that. I already know you were trying to kill me. So that’s why you were so obsessed with fucking me, right? Because that’s how the ritual goes? You must have been laughing at me the whole time, huh? Me, babying you, protecting you, saving you – you must have thought I looked so _stupid._ That innocent act of yours, the way you would cry so prettily – it was all fake, wasn’t it? The whole time I was here, feeling, feeling like –“ Thor stumbles over his words, all awkward and jutting in his mouth, cuts himself off abruptly. “And you were just planning to _kill_ me.” He looks at Loki accusingly. “Planning to cut my throat in my sleep.”

“Thor,” Loki wails, and he’s really crying now, sobbing, his body shaking like a leaf in the wind. “Thor I wasn’t _going_ to-“

“Don’t you **_dare_** do that,” Thor says, nostrils flaring, eyes sharper than cut glass. “Don’t you dare just sit there and cry and look so _goddamn_ beautiful –“

Loki jumps out of the bed, reaches for Thor desperately, cups Thor’s face with his hands, reaches on his tippy toes so that they’re face to face.

“Thor, I wasn’t going to.” He says anxiously. “You have to believe me. I didn’t want to, even at the beginning, but the coven forced me to. And then when I got to know you, and I started liking you even more, I _really_ didn’t want to. So I left after we-after I’d lain with you” _and nine hells if Loki’s face doesn’t still color at the thought of it_ , “to tell my coven leader that I couldn’t do it, and that you were a noble, and that killing you would have consequences. Thor, I would’ve gotten on my _knees_ to save your life. I would’ve begged like a dog. I would have cut my beating heart straight out of my chest if that’s what it took. I didn’t _want_ to kill you,” and here Loki’s lips wobbles, feels like he’s crumbling again, **_needs_** Thor to believe him, but Thor only looks at him so coldly, so unmovable and unbending. “Thor, I promise. _Please_ believe me.” And here Loki’s voice is shaking again, tears falling from his face. “Thor, I- _I love you._ I love **_you_**.”

And it’s only as Loki’s saying the words that he realizes how true they are, how applicable they are to the feeling in his chest, the thing bigger than himself, bigger than his body, that feeling that makes him feel like he would do anything just to stand by Thor’s side.

It’s so heavy, that feeling. Keeps him from floating right up into the sky. Keeps him chained right to the ground.

But this must be the last straw for Thor because he snaps, something hot and bright filling his eyes, something ugly, and he brings his hand to Loki’s throat, crushes into the muscles there, and throws him against the wall.

“I'm going to **_kill_** you.” He snarls. “I'm going to kill you the way I should’ve killed you the first time I saw you.”

Loki has never seen Thor so angry before. Thor is good at keeping his feeling expertly hidden but right now that mask burns away, all that’s left pure hate, teeth bared in a snarl, eyes a dark blue like when a storm hits.

Loki struggles against his grip, claws at the hands wrapped around his throat, tries to use his seidr.

But nothing comes. Incantations flicker fast in Loki’s brain but none work, and when Loki tries to bring fire to his hands it doesn’t come.

_What in the nine hells? But there isn’t any dwarfish gold. His necklace wasn’t dwarfish gold. There’s nothing…he can’t…he **can’t** do this…_

But Thor is doing it. He’s killing him, cutting off the oxygen to his brain, crushing his throat.

Loki closes his eyes. He’s starting to lose consciousness, goes limp in Thor’s grip, his hands dropping from where Thor’s are wrapped around his neck.

_Is this how it ends? Without him ever believing me? Is this how I…_

Thor drops Loki to the floor.

Loki wakes, coughs and gasps for breath, his vision blurry, filled with tears.

Thor punches a hole in the wall above his head with a snarl and turns away from Loki, breathing hard.

He says something Loki can't catch, and then he says it louder.

“FUCK!” He yells.

After a long moment of them catching their breath Loki stands. He walks carefully to Thor’s side, puts a hand on his shoulder.

Thor shakes his hand off. When he turns to face Loki, his face is expectantly blank.

“Don’t ever touch me again,” he says, and then brushes past him, so perfect and so effortlessly cool and not even looking at him.

-

Thor leaves in the dawn.

He packs his horse with supplies, not looking at Loki at all, Loki hovering nervously nearby, biting on his nails.

“Can I leave with you?” Loki asks quietly.

“No.” Thor replies back bluntly.

“But…” Loki starts, and then trails off.

_But they’re going to hurt me. They’re going to punish me for my mistake._

“I don’t want to stay here, Thor. I don’t like it here. You don’t have to take me with you. Just drop me off at the nearest town. Please.” Loki lays a hand on his arm. Thor pauses in his packing, his eyes on Loki’s hand, before flicking up to watch him.

He shakes his hand off.

“No,” he repeats. “How would you even live? You don’t know anything about how real life is. You’d need to have a job. You’d need money. And you don’t know how to do anything worthwhile. How would you get enough money to live?”

“I could work in a brothel,” Loki suggests, and Thor’s back stiffens. “You don’t have to learn much for that. And, and I'm pretty.” Loki says defiantly. “I'm sure I’d get enough customers.”

“No,” Thor says, and this time it’s sharper. He tugs on the reins of his horse just a little too rough. “I'm not taking you to a town, but I'm especially not taking you to a town if all you’re going to do is work in a brothel.”

“Why not?” Loki cries out, offended. “You think I wouldn’t get enough customers, is that it?”

Thor turns around in a flurry, his mouth set in a harsh line.

“Yes, I think that’s exactly it.” He spits. “You have the build of a pre-pubescent boy. You wouldn’t have any customers so you’d most likely starve when winter came. And even if you did have customers, you’d make a terrible whore. There’s nothing about you that’s appealing, you cry too much about everything, and you forced me to go slow even though it almost killed me.”

Loki’s lip trembles. “I wasn’t…I wasn’t that bad. There must be some men who, who _like_ that.”

Thor’s eyes narrow. “Oh? And did I mention? You have about as much sex appeal as a toad.”

Loki gasps, angry beyond reason. “You..! You!” He’s so angry he doesn’t even have any words. “Fine!” He yells wildly. “You don’t have to take me! I’ll go myself. I don’t need you and your horse. I’ll find my own way out and into town, and then I’ll work in a brothel, and I’ll be the best whore this world has ever seen, I’ll be so famous you’ll even hear about me in the capital-!“

Thor strides forward, nostrils flaring, his eyes as dark as a storm, and grabs her tight by the wrist.

“You will not,” he snarls, shaking her. “Do you understand? Even if I leave here you will _not_ work in a brothel. If I catch wind that you do I will kill every man you ever slept with and wear their teeth like a necklace around my neck. And then I will bring you back here and buy you a cage and lock you in there forever. Do you understand?”

Loki only sneers at him, defiant.

Thor presses so tight on her wrist that Loki cries out.

“Do you _understand?”_

“I understand, I understand!” Loki yells, and Thor releases him.

As soon as he does Loki shoves against his chest, pounds him with his fists, unwanted tears in his eyes from the pain.

“I hate you, Thor! I hate you! I wish we’d never met!” Loki screams, and Thor just stares at him, unreadable, before Loki turns on his heel and runs to the woods.

He cries in the spot where he found Thor, curled inside himself, wailing like something dying, feels like he’s dying, feels his heart in his chest as sharp as cut glass, feels like everything in him hurts.

_Is this what love’s supposed to feel like? Like everything in me is tearing apart? Because I hate it. I absolutely hate it. Why did Thor have to make me feel like this? Why did he have to make me so weak? And now that he’s made me this way, how come he just gets to walk away?_

Loki jumps to his feet, runs back to his hut planning to give Thor a piece of his mind, but when he gets there Thor is already gone. Like he wasn’t even there in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yall are lucky lol the smut came to me!
> 
> anyway, don't worry. i'm not dropping this work. i just need to finish other previous works that i promised to finish. i'll be back. THIS IS NOT ME GIVING UP!!! in fact, i could still write a shit ton of chapters but it wouldn't be fair to my other works.
> 
> the next chapter, whenever it comes, will probably be a time skip.


	11. Part II

**TWO YEARS LATER**

They call him lieutenant.

But he’s not really a lieutenant. He’s not a poor boy drafted into war against his will, climbing the ranks. No, Thor Odinson, their lieutenant, comes to war with open arms. He embraces it. He does not come weary and tired and hungry. He comes on a warpath, ready to win another campaign for his father. And he deserves the title they call him, because he has lived his whole life in a trench, from the time he was a mere eleven summers old.

They do not call him prince. He is not princely, not in the way a Vanir prince would be, all soft and spoiled and no sharp corners. Thor Odinson is a bastard. But they do not call him this either.

What they do call him, sometimes, behind his back, is mad.

Hvolnr tells him

“I knew from the first day he stepped back into this camp he was different. He wasn’t like before.”

Hvolnr, his elbows on the table, leaning in close. He side eyes the lieutenant. Thor is eating quietly at his own table, alone, quiet.

A strange quiet. A tense quiet like a string about to snap.

_Before it wasn’t like this. When Thor came to them at the age of 15, he looked older, yes, had scars on his back, a thin line where a knife was probably held against his jaw, but he wasn’t cold. He didn’t eat meals alone. He sat with them. He laughed with them. His smile came easy around them. He was like an older brother to them. When they went into battle, they weren’t afraid because **Thor** wasn’t afraid. He never made them feel lesser. He never made them feel lacking, or other from him. Four years Thor spent with them like this, before **his** older brother came, Tyr, who was far more experienced, and far crueler. And then Thor got hurt in battle, and Tyr sent him back to the palace, hungry for his campaign, and then, and then…_

“Its because of Tyr.” Kristian replies, albeit a bit unconfidently. “His older brother came to hijack his campaign. Of course he’s upset. Thor has been here longer than all of us combined.”

But Hvolnr disagrees. “If he was upset, he would say something. He’s too quiet. He used to talk everyone. Now he burns away his energy in the main bombardment camp uselessly, trying to find a shortcut to end this war. He never sleeps. He has bags under his eyes. He looks like the walking dead for _fucks_ sake. And when he does sleep he always says her name, as if possessed, and my god, he even pretends to _talk_ to her sometimes, did you know, Finna told me-“

Kristian’s utensils clatter in his haste to close Hvolnr’s mouth.

If there is one thing they’ve learned from this newer, darker lieutenant – it’s to never to speak her name.

_Ase._

Everyone knows of course. The story.

Thor was never meant to stay long at the palace. He was going to return promptly back to Svartalfheim, to continue the campaign.

_His campaign, no matter what the Tyr supporters will tell you otherwise._

But, while at the palace, there were complaints of witchery in Grimstad, and their lieutenant went to refute them along with three guards.

And then he didn’t come back.

_The shock Kristian had when he heard the news. The denial. The fear, the sadness. All of it was obvious in the camp. The only one who had been happy was Tyr. He’d laughed. He’d told them all the news, read it from a letter he got from his father, Emperor Odin._

_‘Reports state Thor is lost to Grimstad. What was supposed to be a one day trek has now derailed into weeks. Though it is too early to say, it is most likely Thor Odinson is dead.’_

_Tyr had forced everyone to listen. He’d gathered them in the main field. He held the letter for everyone to see, the Emperors seal, the officialness of it all._

_“Look what has happened to your precious lieutenant. Your hero! Dead and gone.” Tyr had laughed. “Isn’t it the most glorious news?”_

But after a whole month had passed, in which most believed all four to be dead, only their lieutenant came back alive, completely unharmed.

Hvolnr glares at Kristian, shoves his hand away from his mouth.

“You know what happened. We all know what happened. The lieutenant was _bewitched_.”

Horrible words. Dangerous words.

“Don’t say that.” Kristian hisses, looking this way and that to make sure no one has heard them.

“Just look at him.” Hvolnr replies, and -

Thor Odinson eats his food slow, a dark look in his face, his fists clenched white around his utensils. He looks like he’s in pain. He looks like he wants to burn the entire world to the ground.

“He’s mad, Kristian. One day he’s going to lead us into battle and start killing everyone, no matter what the side. He doesn’t even go to the _brothels_ anymore and he used to go like crazy. Envil’s on the war council and he says sometimes Thor will be talking and all of a sudden go quiet, as if someone’s talking in his ear. As if she’s right by his side, advising him. The longer he goes without seeing this witch the closer he gets to snapping. I'm telling you, Kristian. You know the saying. Catch the taste of a witch and…”

“…and you’ll never be sane again.” Kristian finishes grimly.

He stares at their lieutenant, so cold and sharp, and wonders what kind of person was colder and sharper, to penetrate him so.

-

Thor sees her everywhere.

The first time he goes back to a brothel, unconsciously, he searches for raven hair. He doesn’t even realize why until he’s halfway through fucking the whore and he sees Ase all of a sudden, in a corner.

He stares, pauses mid thrust. He wonders if he’s going crazy.

Ase smiles wide. A Cheshire cat’s smile. She laughs, and it’s so beautiful, so familiar, that Thor’s heart aches at the sound of it. And then she says

_“What a cheap replacement,”_

And it ruins everything.

Thor goes soft. The whore stares at him, confused, and Thor realizes she looks nothing like Ase. Ase’s hair was beyond black. It was iridescent. Ase’s face was sharper, her eyes a bright green; meanwhile the whore has a doughy face, and muddy brown eyes. And her tits are too big.

Thor rushes out of the room, reaching for his clothes in a haste, feeling sick. Ase laughs the whole time.

Thor doesn’t go back to a brothel again.

He thinks that’ll be it but it’s not.

Sometimes during council meetings she’ll appear and make sharp, witty comments on battle strategies. Thor has to pretend the hardest then, that he can't see her. Sometimes Ase will make it even harder. She’ll walk up behind him and wrap her arms around his shoulders and Thor has to pretend not to feel anything.

When Thor’s having a bad day, he sees her. When he’s alone in his tent, he sees her. Even his dreams are unprotected, and every night she’s in them.

Thor knows it not really her. He knows it’s him just going crazy. But the only thing that drives him crazier is the wondering.

_Where is she? Is she still in Grimstad? Did she make it to a brothel? Is she fucking other men? What is she doing without_ **me?**

It’s a sickness, the wondering. Thor should be focused on the campaign, not on a girl who tried to take his life. But everyday, his ambitions for the campaign, for the throne, wane in comparison to the looming shadow of Ase in his mind.

_Where is she? What is she doing? What is she doing without me?_

Ase is a fever in his blood.

-

“Thor calls for you.”

Kristian on his bunk playing cards with Hvolnr. He immediately stand to attention at the entrance of the ensign.

“What for?”

The ensign’s eyes slide to Hvolnr, and then back to Kristian.

“Secret business.”

Thor is in his tent getting ready when Kristian walks in. His clothes are nothing special, the same assigned to any soldier in any encampment. Rugged, brown, old leather boots. A tough hide jacket and trousers.

Kristian sees the back of him first. Taller than any other man in their encampment. His hair has been cut short and Kristian can see the tan expanse of his neck. Thor turns.

“Kristian,” he says curtly, everything in his manner business.

Kristian nods his head. Deference.

“Lieutenant.”

Thor’s blue eyes are icier than any tundra on Jotunheim. There is no traces of humor to be found on his face, not like when he first came to Svartalfheim. And there is a certain tightness to his lips that makes him look like he’s in pain.

_He is my age. He is my age but he looks older._

“They say you asked for me.”

“Scribe business.” Thor says distractedly. He is looking at something at the other side of the room. “I needed someone I could trust.”

Kristian’s back straightens. He feels the first strong stirrings of pride in his gut.

“Of course.”

When they leave the room together, Kristian looks to see what Thor’s gaze was captured by, but finds nothing.

-

Thor does not tell Kristian they are meeting with Tyr.

His entrance into the camp is much like his personality – excessive.

While Thor blends into their camp, could be any other soldier like the rest, Tyr makes it clearly known by his state of dress what his rank is.

Tyr is the same height as Thor, but wider, and older, and wears old imperial military dress. There are medallions pinned to his lapel and his boots are an obsidian darker than coal from the mines of Muspelheim. The shine of them is glaring.

“Brother!” Tyr calls, humor in his voice, with a smile wider than the Hvjerfell mountain range.

Looking at them, you wouldn’t think they were brothers.

Tyr, with his excessive luxuries, and his thick frame, looks like a Muspelheim warlord. His hair is dark, not quite the typical Jotunheim black, but close, and his eyes are the muddy brown of the earth after it rains. His smile is easy but sharp, and one’d you’d do better not to trust.

Thor, in comparison, is leaner. He face is not quite as mean, or riddled with scars, and he does not look like a lord of any kind. There is no imperial dress for him, or new money luxuries. His smile is not so easy but calculating, and he simply nods back in response.

“Tyr,” he replies, voice absent of any emotion.

“You are not happy to see me?” Tyr mocks.

This, of all things, seems to bring a smile to Thor’s face.

“You are not happy to see me either. I heard of your reaction when Odin told you I was still alive. Still bitter, brother?”

For a second, the smile is replaced by a look of bottomless hatred. And then just as quickly the smile is back, albeit with a bit of edge to it.

“Yes, well, this is your second time getting lost in the woods, Thor. Excuse me if this time, I thought you would have the least bit of decency to die there.”

“I apologize. I couldn’t help myself the satisfaction of seeing your face when I returned.”

Thor and Tyr stand on the same ground, at the same height, at two vastly different poles. One is a mere 21 summers old, while the other is 29. They may be brothers, but by the way the two look at each other, you would never guess.

_(they look upon each other as enemies. they look upon one another as if there were no greater scourge of the earth)_

Kristian does not like Tyr. He does not like the bottomless greed of his countenance, or the way he feasts on war like vultures seeking dead.

“Quite a pity,” Tyr replies back finally, no irony at all to be found in his tone, and it is quite obvious what he finds to be a pity.

_Quite a pity you are alive._

“Anyway, this is not the business I have come for.” Tyr’s eyes slide to Kristian’s, and then just as quickly back to Thor. He looks at Kristian as if he were nothing but a ghost. “I see you have chosen your scribe. I have chosen mine. I hope you have chosen wisely, for the information Odin has given us is very…sensitive.”

Where before such information would’ve struck a fire in Thor’s soul, anticipation in his face plain for everyone to see, this Thor seems listless, almost bored.

He looks back at his tent for a long moment, before turning back to face Tyr.

“Alright then.” Thor replies, and there is not a single trace of excitement in his tone. “Lead the way.”

-

They hike for what seem seems like forever, down in to impasses, and craggy ledges and ridgeways, rocks that gives way to nothingness, a mountain range with no end.

Tyr seems to talk forever as well.

“They all say you were bewitched.”

Kristian walks behind Thor. He sees the way his back stiffens, the tightness in his jaw.

“She did not bewitch me.”

“Ah. So there was a specific witch then?”

“I do not wish to speak of this.”

“I don’t understand then. How did you escape? How did you escape when so many other died, have died there, are still dying there?” Tyr’s tone is pensive. “Is it that devils luck of yours? The gods shining down on you like always?”

Thor says nothing. Tyr continues.

“They say you do not feast for battle like before. That now you hunger for…other things. Is this true brother? You certainly did not seem interested today with the information Odin has chosen to gift to us.”

“If I have no interest, it is only because I know it is another thing you will wish to steal from me, Tyr,” Thor says flatly, not even bothering to look at them.

Tyr laughs, seemingly pleased. “How easy it would be to take Svartalfheim from you now.”

“Go ahead and try, Tyr. You will find yourself dead before morning.”

But even Thor’s insults seem to lack heat now, his mind obviously somewhere else, and Tyr seems to catch on this as well.

“Your witch…what did they say her name was now? Ashleigh? Astrid? Ase?”

Thor twitches.

Tyr smiles, a dog with a bird between his teeth.

“She must have been quite beautiful, your Ase, for you to have gone quite mad over her.”

“I am not mad over her,” Thor mutters.

Tyr quirks an eyebrow, looks at Kristian for half a second, as if to say

_Can you believe it? He thinks me a fool._

“They say you dream of her. You see her when she’s not there. That you have visions-“

Thor turns so quickly on his heel Kristian doesn’t catch sight of it for a second, and knocks Tyr backward with his hands, teeth bared in a snarl, more emotion on his face than Kristian has seen in months.

“I do not have _visions_ of her.”

The amusement is gone from Tyr’s face in a flash.

“Do not touch me, Thor.” He says quietly, an edge to his voice, and the air is thicker than Asgard before a hard rain. “You know better than to touch me.”

Thor turns back before Kristian can see the look on his face.

“Then do not speak her name.”

-

They hear it before they see it.

It sounds like it could be the heart of the earth. That’s how loud the explosions are. It sounds like a mountain rage splitting apart.

They round the bend and everything is soaked in orange light. It is night time but the valley is illuminated. It could very well be the sun down there in that valley, so strong are its rays, its brilliance, casting malicious shadows as far as the eye can see.

Tyr’s eyes are captivated.

“My god…these dark elves…what have they done? What have they _bought?”_

Thor turns at that last part, eyes still slightly dazzled, but much less so than Tyr’s.

His eyebrows furrow. “Bought?”

Tyr does not even bother to turn to look at Thor.

“You stupid fool,” he says, still dazzled. “Do you not see the source of this madness?”

Thor turns, looks more closely, and so does Kristian.

At the bottom of the valley, casting fireball after fireball against the mountain, is a single girl in chains.

“It’s a _witch_ ,” Kristian cannot help but breathe out, terrible awe in his voice.

“A witch?” Thor sounds surprised.

Finally, Tyr’s sharp eyes leave the girls’, and settle on Thor’s.

“Not just a witch.” He says sharply. “A war witch. Look at her. You can tell she’s been bought. Her chains. Her blindfold. Her power…it’s ungodly. Only war witches hold such a terrible gift. They pay the highest price for it. And with her caliber…I can only assume she’s from the Church of Nine Dead Men. The best of the best.”

Once again, Thor looks stumped.

“The Church of Nine Dead Men? Is that like the church in Vanaheim? The Church of Five Stars?” Thor stares. “But I thought those witches were simply oracles.”

Tyr laughs. “You know very little about witches for all your time spent with them, little brother.” Tyr mocks, and Thor’s fists tighten. “The Church of Nine Dead Men is a twisted parody of the Church of Five Stars. They’re essentially slave traders. They abduct girls with seidr straight from their cribs. And it’s called nine dead men because there are nine realms and they do business in each. They train girls with the gift of seidr from a young age to become weapons. To grow to womanhood is a feat in itself. Most girls…” Tyr smiles wryly. “Well, most girls die trying.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Thor says stubbornly. “’I’ve seen witches before. Father took me to a burning once. All they did was mewl pathetically. They couldn’t even get out of their bonds.”

Tyr scoffs, unimpressed. “Of course father did. It’s a power trip for him, seeing those pathetic creatures. Untrained, unrefined, and afraid of their gifts. Of course he would want you to see them at their weakest. Odin…” and here is the slightest bight of guardedness on Tyr’s face, a dog-like wariness. “Odin’s had…personal experience with a witch. In the past. Not a good one, obviously. He was a bit like you afterwards. Sick with…infatuation.”

Kristian stiffens, expects Thor to lash out at that, but Thor seems to focus on the part about King Odin.

“Odin was infatuated with a witch? Odin, as in our father? Who greeds for nothing except land money and power?”

“You act surprised. Where else could such a passionate hatred of witches spring from, Thor, may I ask, other than a rebuff from one?”

Thor goes silent then, pensive, watching the war witch in the valley.

After a long silence, save for the booming of the mountains, Tyr rustles, his rings clinking against one another as he stretches.

“Well, surely all is hopeless now. You have lost it, Thor. Your precious Svartalfheim. With a war witch on their side they will squash you easier than a foot crushing an ant.” Tyr laughs. “And here I came in the wake of your disappearance, ready to steal all your hard work. Turns out it was all for naught. This campaign, as I told you long ago, brother, is unwinnable.”

Thor is seems oblivious to Tyr’s words, still staring at the girl in the valley. Caught.

Tyr makes a thoughtful _hm_. “Of course, if you had your own war witch, you might stand a chance. But a witch of that caliber would cost all of Asgard’s coffers-“

“That’s it.” Thor breaks his gaze away from the girl, looks at them with almost feverish eyes.

Tyr stares. “What?”

“All I need is a witch and I know where to find one. For free. If I go back to Grimstad there’s a chance As- the witches are still there. I could just steal one. Just like the Church of Nine Dead Men. And I could figure out a way to train her, to use her to win my campaign, to keep her with me at all times-“

Kristian stares. Tyr stares. Tyr’s scribe stares. And then Tyr breaks out laughing.

“Felix- Felix, _please_ tell me you’re writing this all down,” he gasps out between laughter to his scribe. “Please tell me there is a written copy of this, _please!_ The insanity! The self delusion of you! You really- _you really are_ as mad as they say! You are not my brother. What did you do to him, my Thor? That snake, that heartless predator who held love for nothing? Is he gone? Has he succumbed to a sickness? Because that is all it could be! I look at you, Thor, but you are not even here. You are somewhere else. You are far away from me. You are _lost._ ”

But Thor isn’t paying attention, his gaze once again caught on the war witch in the valley, the orange of her flames in his eyes, and he looks feverish, mad, more alive than Kristian has seen him in months; nothing dull in those eyes but instead an intense and frightening determination.

Tyr and his scribe are leaving, packing their things, but Thor is still stuck to the scene in the valley.

“He will die there,” Kristian overhears Tyr telling Felix. “He is a fool to go again after the Gods let him escape the first time. No god or devil is kind enough to let him live a second time. Of all my brothers I never thought it would be _Thor_ who would succumb to this madness. But look at him. He is gone. All I see in his eyes is that witch of his. She is calling for him and he will die trying to get back to her.”

Tyr laughs, something full of mirth, eyes filled with a terrible joy.

“Ave Malefica!” He praises.

“ _Hail to the witch_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> don't know when next chapter will be out. released this because i could. but, comments always help motivate me :p


	12. Curse

The moon is full and there is man between Loki’s thighs.

“You are very beautiful,” the man slurs, some old and pathetic logger, his belly fuller than the moon even, his breath reeking of alcohol, and it takes everything in Loki not to recoil.

“You are too kind, sir,” Loki purrs instead, his long hair flowing behind him like a veil, the full moon settling over them in a soft light, everything about him ensnaringly woman-like tonight.

“All your sisters,” the man prattles on uselessly, “all your sisters are very beautiful, but you in particular…” The man trails off, something in his gaze fervent and worshipful. “You are otherworldly.”

Loki tries not to roll his eyes too hard. Instead he gives another fake breathy little sigh as the man fucks into him, Loki’s legs wrapped around his hips.

He pretends to enjoy it. He pretends he wants it. In reality, Loki’s bored and barely even present.

_‘You took my cock so good. You’re such a good girl, baby. I'm so proud of you.’_

Loki jerks out his thoughts.

His heart is pounding. When the man thrusts into him again, the cry Loki lets out is genuine.

_Why did you think of that? Why? It’s no good to think of useless things. Of things you can't have. Of things that you’ll **never** have._

It happens sometimes. Loki eighteen summers old, far from a virgin anymore, has taken more men that he can count, but Thor is the only one who haunts him still. The only one who has ever showed him true pleasure.

The logger is starting to thrust into Loki faster now, his grunts and sighs louder, more desperate, and Loki knows he’s close. Loki pretends to be too.

This is another thing on the infinite list of things that Loki will never forgive Thor for.

_He ruined everything for me. I can't even enjoy sex because I know there’s something better than this out there. Every time I take a man, all I feel is disgust. Sickness to my core. Like I'm covered in slime._

With one last vicious thrust the logger cums in her, lays all his weight on her, smiles with his rotten teeth.

“How was it?” He leers.

And Loki smiles. Her hands behind his back, she gets her knife from a place he can't see.

“Disgusting,” she croons, and before his face can change to anger, slits his throat.

The logger’s blood is all over her. The light of the moon hits her blade and it shines wickedly. She feels a burst of force flare inside of her, and the Dark forest shivers with her power.

_‘You’re such a good girl. My good girl. My everything.’_

Loki closes her eyes, her hands tight in a fist, and tries, uselessly, to forget.

 _Liar,_ she thinks instead. _Filthy liar._

-

This is how love dies.

Loki’s sister come in the night to take him. He says sisters, but really it was only Herkja and Brunhilde.

Brunhilde smiles maliciously. Loki is in the same spot where he found Thor, curled into a ball. Herkja’s and Brun’s faces are blurry to him because his eyes are filled with tears.

“No full moon now, Loki-boy.” Brun says. “Your hideousness is uncovered.”

“So is yours, hag.” Loki spits, and curls into himself even deeper.

Brun’s smile falls for a second, before coming back even brighter.

“I take it he left you then? Your love? So that we could hurt you? So that we could tear you apart.” Brun laughs. “What a grand love. What is it you told me, or tried to tell me anyway, when your were beating my head into the floorboards? _I don’t know anything_ ,’ Brun mocks, ‘ _about how people with actual hearts can care about other people!’”_

The ache of it. The _ache._

“He didn’t know.” Loki whispers. “He didn’t know what would happen to me. He – he thought I was going to kill him.”

“You were supposed to kill him,” Herkja intervenes finally, her obsidian eyes eerie in the moonlight. “Of course, when you found out he was a baron, you should’ve let him go immediately. But you didn’t. You dallied. You were _weak_.”

“He was a prince.” Loki murmurs. “Odin’s son.”

Brun inhales sharply. Herkja’s eyes narrow.

“Who told you that?”

Loki stares. “You knew?”

“Of course I knew!” Herkja snaps. “The name Thor can only belong to one boy. Not to mention his mother…”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?” Loki sits up, angry. “You just pretended not to know.”

“You judge me? You reprimand me? When you brought the son of the witches bane into our HOME?” Herkja seethes. She reaches one clawed hand to grab at Loki’s jaw roughly, quicker than a flash.

“You are sixteen summers old. You refuse to take a man. You promised me you’d take this boy, but instead you put us all in danger. There are consequences to this, Loki. _Consequences._ ”

Loki laughs, his neck arched, jaw tight in Herkja’s hands. Loki laughs so hard he cries.

“What are you going to take from me?” He says, gone. “He’s already taken everything from me.”

And Brun, in the light of an incomplete moon, smiles, all her crooked teeth on display.

“Not everything,” she croons.

-

This is how love dies.

Brun walks him like a prisoner back to the main compound. The sisters are there, on their ledges, seem to be there always, waiting for him. Except its not the full moon anymore, and they’re all hideous and old and monstrous in the half light. The shadows cast them all into something wicked.

“Loki-boy! Loki-boy is here!”

“Loki-boy didn’t take a man!”

“Loki-boy didn’t spill blood!”

“How shall we punish him sister?”

“Sister Herkja may I steal his fingers?”

“I want his green eyes!”

“I want his lips!”

“Can we hang him?”

“Can we light him on fire?!”

Herkja smiles at them. Tar eyes. Dirty fingers. Long nails. She looks at Brun and Brun pushes Loki into the mob and they tear into him, grab him by his hair, spit in his face, beat on him with their fists, and someone even swipes three of his fingers.

Pinky ring and index. Gone with the cut of dull blade.

Loki screams.

Brun pulls him back out of the mob by his hair, sneers at the girls who try to get another hit in.

“Enough. Sister Herkja let you have your fun. Now it’s time for her to decide Loki-boy’s punishment.”

The other sisters skulk away and Brun drags Loki by his hair, his hands still bleeding, Herkja leading the way.

“Please.” Loki sobs, because he forgot how it can be. How terrible. How painful. “Please Herkja. _Please_ sister.” And Herkja twitches at that. “Isn’t that what I am? Aren’t I your sister? That’s what you say to all of us. Would you treat your sister this way?”

Herkja’s insect eyes stare back at him.

“You have never been a sister to us, Loki. How could you? You’re a boy. And you’re a curse.”

And then Brun throws him into the pit.

-

This is how love dies.

Brun ties Loki to the ground, everyone of his limbs stretched beyond what should be human.

Herkja takes his eyes first. She does this cleanly and quickly, and not with a hot poker like she did last time.

“So it’s harder for you to grow it back.” She says plainly, which Loki doesn’t understand, but maybe he doesn’t understand because of the sheer pain he’s in.

_Harder to grow what back?_

But then Herkja thrusts her knife into his chest and he knows.

-

She cuts into him slowly. Makes a heart shaped hole.

Loki screams something unholy.

He can feel his seidr burning through the bonds, and Brun’s sweating just to keep him in them.

“Herkja.” Brun’s eyebrows are creased with exhaustion. “Herkja I can't hold him for long. He’s too strong. He’s-“

“Brun.” Herkja says calmly, still cutting into Loki. “How many men have you killed? Both here and as a war witch. And you’re telling me you can't handle Loki-boy?”

“He’s stronger than I thought.” Brun grits out.

“He’s sixteen.”

The forest is shaking. Trees are creaking, moaning, being uprooted straight from the ground with every cut Herkja makes. Loki-boy is upset. Loki-boy is showing his pain.

“I didn’t have this kind of power when I was sixteen. And neither did you.”

They don’t say anything for a long while after that. The only sounds are Loki screaming, which even his hurricane-like winds can't swallow.

-

Herkja holds his beating heart in her hands for a second.

Then she throws it to the ground, to some random corner in the dirt.

With all the ugly things. With all the other dead things. With all the worms and maggots and dead men that lie just below the surface.

Loki doesn’t know how long he’s in the pit. He has to grow his heart back in the dark, without his eyes. It’s painful. His chest hurts. All the pretty things he liked about Thor turn into ugly things.

_If it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be here. He pretended to care about me, but it was more condescension. He liked knowing more than me. Or at least thinking he did. He liked that my weakness made him strong._

_I hate him._

_I hate him._

_I hate him I hate him I hate him I **hate**_

This is how love dies.

-

Loki knows he’s a little crazy. After all, one can't live in a dark pit without a heart and eyes or any sense of time and NOT go crazy.

But after what seems like forever, he does it. Grows his heart back. Grows his eyes back.

_Do you know the heart pumps blood to every other organ in your body? Do you know how it feels to have your heart not pump anything, because you don’t have it? To not be able to move? To not be able to think clearly? To not be able to breathe?_

_(loki knows)_

And when he does, he looks at his old heart. In the corner. With the dirty things. Already half decayed.

 _This is the heart that loved Thor Odinson_ , Loki thinks hysterically for a second. _Already, half of it is gone._

_Is he thinking about me like I'm thinking about him? Does he miss me? Does he regret leaving? Has he forgotten all about me already with one of his capital girls?_

Loki’s new heart burns.

 _No,_ Loki thinks. **No**. _No, because you don’t love him anymore. You don’t care._

But that doesn’t mean Loki can't make Thor think about him. That doesn’t mean he can't get revenge.

Loki looks at his old heart. It’s half decayed but. But.

_There’s a lot of spells you can do with a heart like that._

_A lot of spells._

Loki smiles for the first time in what seems like forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW! the response to the chapter i posted was so amazing i HAD to write another chapter! this one is much shorter but i could tell yall wanted to know what happened to loki so i didnt want to keep yall in suspense. yall really deserved this chapter omg. thank you all so much for the lovely comments it really does keep me writing and you have no idea how much they mean to me. some of yalls i be rereading to get my fill of serotonin LOL


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